Crone's Moon: A Rowan Gant Investigation

by M. R. Sellars

  “Nothin’ that concerns you right now,” Ben shot back.

  “It’s got to be something big,” the officer pressed. “A city homicide detective and a Fed out here in the dark…”

  “Look, Officer…” Constance started.

  “Martin,” he replied.

  “Officer Martin,” she continued. “We’re working against the clock here, and we don’t have time for this. Now, has anyone gone in?”

  I was only a few steps from the fence now, and I knew that I was going to be discovered at any moment. I was going to be very hard to miss when I started climbing.

  “Not yet,” the officer replied. “Dispatch is sending a car to the main gate.”

  “Good, I’ll go meet them,” Constance announced. “Storm, why don’t you and Rowan…”

  The moment I heard my name, I knew my time was up. I took the last two steps at a run and launched myself up onto the fence. Twining my fingers into the metal links, I kicked the toes of my shoes into the small holes finding any kind of hold I could as I scrambled to pull myself upward.

  “Rowan!” Agent Mandalay exclaimed, obviously noticing me.

  “Jeezus H. Christ!” came Ben’s bellowing voice amid the sounds of them starting to move. “Rowan! Stop!”

  My only saving grace was that they were stunned enough by my action not to have started moving immediately. The delay, brief as it was, allowed enough time for me to put distance between the ground and me.

  By the time they reached the fence, I was already pitching my waist over the rubber mat and rolling forward. I wasn’t about to win any medals for my dismount, but I still managed to drop myself to the ground on the opposite side with only a minor stumble.

  As soon as I gained my footing, at my back I could hear Ben’s exclamation, “Goddammit, Rowan, STOP!”

  My gut reaction was to simply start running as fast as I could in the opposite direction of the fence. I looked forward into the woods, following the filtered beam of the uniformed officer’s flashlight that was apparently aimed at my back. I hesitated and then took a step toward the dense thicket.

  “Dammit, white man, I said STOP! What the hell are you doing?” Ben yelled at me through the fence.

  I froze and cast a glance back in his direction.

  “She came in this way, Ben,” I shot back. “She had to have a reason.”

  I couldn’t see his expression. The flashlight was aimed at my face, and the glare blinded me to any details. Ben was a massive silhouette against the chain link, flanked by the smaller shadows of Agent Mandalay and the patrol officer. I held up my hand in an attempt to block the light.

  “Wait up,” my friend finally said with a heavy sigh, then turned to the Woodcrest officer. “Gimme the flashlight.” Surprisingly, the officer didn’t argue and instead simply handed over the multi-cell Mag-lite without a word.

  “You stay here,” Ben instructed him as he switched off the light and tucked it into his belt. “Mandalay, you meet the other uniforms at the main gate and work your way in. If you find her first, call me on my cell.”

  “How will you know where you’re going?” Mandalay asked quickly.

  “Hell if I know,” Ben spat as he hoisted himself onto the fence and began to climb. “Ask Rowan.”

  CHAPTER 24:

  The bulk of the nearly two thousand acre park was a woodland refuge, bordered along the western edge by the Missouri River. Taken in that context, finding a solitary, petite, redheaded woman amid it all presented itself as an overwhelming task. Fortunately, we knew where she had entered, and she probably had no more than a thirty-minute head start. We hoped.

  The thing that kept gnawing at me, however, was what she could manage to bring upon herself in those thirty minutes. I quickly found myself dwelling on the possibilities and had to force them out of my head at regular intervals, lest I become literally paralyzed by a fear of what might be. The thoughts were already playing hell with my confidence. The last thing I needed was to have an emotional meltdown before we even found her.

  I didn’t have a solid idea of where to go from here. For all I knew, she could have simply plunged directly into the woods; or she could have followed the fence line and entered them elsewhere. However, it seemed logical that if she had taken the time to scale the fence at this specific point, walking the fence was probably the least likely of the options. So, I decided to take the straight-line approach and set out into the tree line.

  I had been to the park enough times to know that it was segmented along one small portion by a railroad that was still in use. And, as I recalled, the railway ran through the edge of the park we had just entered. Something told me the tracks were where Felicity was heading. I don’t know why the rail line popped into my head, or even why it would have been the destination of the killer. But at this point, intuition was all I had going for me, and I wasn’t going to doubt it. Not yet, anyway.

  The first fifty yards of our trek had been uphill, and with me in a frantic lead, we had topped the ridge quickly. Still, even with fear and adrenalin driving me, I was winded, and so was Ben.

  The night had only allowed the air temperature to dip into the mid-eighties, and with our proximity to the river, the humidity was making it feel more like the high nineties. I was already drenched in sweat, and I suspected Ben was as well. Even though he was certainly in better shape than me, the closeness of the air combined with the upward sprint was enough to open anyone’s pores wide.

  “Jeezus, white man,” my friend huffed as we came to a halt atop the rise. “Can’t you two do anything the easy way?”

  I ignored the question. I was pretty sure he didn’t really want an answer, and besides, I was far too busy to talk. I was standing as still as I could manage, reaching out for my wife with every earthly sense I had available. My eyes were searching for shadows in the harsh beam of the flashlight as I played it across the landscape before me. All the while, I was listening for telltale sounds of movement; or even, goddess forbid, a distant scream. Every now and then, I would take a moment to concentrate on breathing in hopes of catching a whiff of her perfume. Unfortunately, I was yielding no results.

  Of course, I wasn’t stopping at the physical. On a preternatural level, I was sending feelers out far ahead; but, thus far, I was having no more luck in that arena than the other. I’m sure my now rampant fear for Felicity’s safety was clouding my ability to sense anything outside the scope of the mundane, but still, I truly believed that I should have felt something. The fact that I couldn’t only served to frighten me more.

  Sunrise was now less than forty minutes away. A quick glance upward through the small gaps in the trees showed that the sky was beginning to pale with the first inkling of the approaching dawn. Still, the canopy of foliage overhead was containing the darkness as if it were a black fog— hugging it close to the ground and obscuring the landscape.

  “This way,” I said after a moment, aiming the flashlight down a gradual slope.

  “You sure?” Ben asked.

  “As sure as I can be at the moment,” I returned, my voice edgy.

  We started downward, stumbling as we worked our way through the murky forest, thick undergrowth hindering our every step.

  “It’s gonna be okay,” Ben told me. “Felicity’s not stupid, Row. She’s not gonna do anything that’d get her hurt.”

  “It’s not her doing the something stupid I’m worried about,” I explained. “It’s whatever she’s tapped into. The spirits of the dead don’t always have the living’s best interest at heart.”

  We continued in silence for a moment. I could tell he was chewing on what I had just said.

  “Are you sayin’ Larson’s ghost would try to hurt her?” he finally asked.

  “Probably not on purpose, butssppptt…” I replied, sputtering suddenly as a low hanging branch caught me across the face, then barked an exclamation. “Dammit!” I stopped, reached up and pushed the near invisible trap out of my way, then continued my answer as I forged the pat
h. “Like I was saying, not on purpose. But, tortured souls are in search of one thing, and that’s closure. Since conduits into this world are few and far between, they tend to clamp on and not let go… The results aren’t always pretty.”

  “Like what happens to you,” he grunted.

  “Yeah,” I returned with a sigh. “Like what happens to me.”

  The foliage seemed to be thinning, and the slowly increasing greyness could almost be visibly detected filtering into the darkness before us. As I forced my way through the thicket, I tilted the flashlight up then panned it around and saw its focused beam disappear into nothingness. Pressing forward, I crunched through the carpet of fallen leaves and aimed myself in what I imagined to be a straight line.

  After several steps, the landscape began to lighten more noticeably even if it was still a muddy twilight. Pushing through the brush, I continued down the incline and soon found myself unceremoniously sliding the last few feet down a vastly sharper drop. Fortunately, I didn’t fall far, landing in what at first appeared to be a shallow clearing.

  I heard Ben skidding down the slope behind me and twisted out of the way just in time to avoid being run over by him as he stumbled out into the open space. I quickly panned the light around, trying to get my bearings and realized that we were standing on a service road.

  It was somewhat overgrown and didn’t appear recently traveled, by vehicle at least. I tilted the flashlight down and scanned the ground, looking for any sign that Felicity might have come through. I harbored no belief that I would find anything so obvious as footprints, but at this point, I was willing to accept anything The Ancients would see fit to bestow upon me.

  Their gift came in the form of an audible clue, although it was connected not with her directly but with my own pet theory about where she would be heading. I listened closely as in the distance a low rumble was beginning to build in both volume and tempo. Unfortunately, the sound was echoing through the woods in a haphazard pattern.

  “Whaddaya think?” Ben asked.

  “Sounds like a train,” I replied.

  “Yeah, but I mean, which way?”

  I sighed and shook my head. Then I pointed the flashlight to my right and began to speak, my tone unsure, “Well, it looks like the road curves up ahead there. Assuming we followed a relatively straight path coming over the ridge and didn’t get turned around, that should take us deeper into the park and toward the train tracks. I’m guessing that’s where she’d be heading.”

  “Why’s that?” he asked.

  “I don’t know. Just a feeling.”

  “Okay. I’m good with that.”

  “Of course, as I recall, the tracks curve,” I added, second-guessing myself. “So she might have gone back the other way. That is if she came through here at all.”

  “So whaddaya wanna do?”

  “I’m pretty sure we kept on a straight course,” I finally said, a tremor of uncertainty still underscoring my words. “If nothing else, going right should take us farther into the park. I think.”

  “Then let’s go,” he urged.

  We started walking, and I twisted my wrist up then pressed the backlight button on my watch. The blue glow lit the dial, and I peered quickly at the numbers. “Five-thirty,” I said over my shoulder. “If she was being guided by some ethereal force, then she knows exactly where she’s going and has probably had plenty of time to get there by now.”

  I was amazed at how calm my voice suddenly sounded because internally I was a wreck. My stomach was twisted into a double knot, and nausea had become a constant companion. A sickly sense of dread was raping my spine and wrapping its cold fingers around the back of my brain.

  The only thing that kept me from completely losing my sanity at this very moment was the fact that I had not felt anything happen on an ethereal level. Felicity and I had a very tight connection with one another and would often share experiences as if we were one person. At the very least, I was sure I’d be able to feel it if she was already in immediate danger.

  At least, that is what I kept telling myself.

  The buzzing annoyance of myriad insects was beginning to fill the air, and we both found ourselves randomly slapping at mosquitoes. Birds had begun to chirp their staccato songs to greet the onset of morning, and I could hear squirrels chittering in the branches above.

  The distant rumble of the train was coming closer, but I still couldn’t pinpoint a direction due to the echo, and that made me even more unsure of my choice. We continued along the unused service road for several yards before I began to slow my pace, eventually coming to a complete stop.

  “What’s wrong?” Ben asked. “You goin’ la-la?”

  “I don’t know, Ben,” I replied, my agitation growing rapidly. “I don’t know if… I’m not… I’m just not sure we’re going in the right direction.”

  “You wanna turn around?” he asked.

  “Gods, I just don’t know,” I replied, fear suddenly bubbling to the top in an attempt to overtake me.

  “Just calm down, Row,” he told me, then looked upward. “Sun’ll be up in less than twenty minutes. It’s already gettin’ light, so why don’t we do this. You keep goin’ this way, and I’ll backtrack and go the other way.”

  I shook my head. “I still don’t even know if she actually used this road, Ben.”

  “Listen, Row, I know you’re upset, but you gotta get a handle on it,” he said. “I’m tellin’ ya’, man, we’re gonna find her and it’s gonna be okay.”

  “How can you know that?” I snapped.

  “Because I’m tellin’ ya that’s how it is,” he responded in a stern voice. “It’s gonna be all good, Rowan. Now go.”

  He turned and started back down the service road, heading quickly away from me through the overgrowth. I watched after him for a moment then swallowed hard and mutely kicked myself for the display of emotion. Where Felicity’s safety was concerned, I had a hard time being rational, and he was correct— I had to stop letting it get the best of me.

  I turned in the opposite direction and started up the road, pressing forward into the almost ninety-degree curve, my head down to follow the spot of the flashlight along the ground. I stepped carefully around a deep rut and continued walking until I rounded the bend.

  When I looked up, the road stretched out before me in a straight line, and the overgrowth was knocked down as if the pathway had been frequented far more recently. In fact, it even looked somewhat maintained. In the distance, the lane passed beneath a short train trestle and beyond that, disappeared into the forest.

  I was mentally debating whether or not I should call Ben back this way when I focused on something slumped against a tree along the roadside, just before the trestle.

  My heart froze in my chest, and the sudden onset of blind panic made my skin prickle hot then cold. The flashlight struck the ground with a thud, its beam now directed against a clump of tall grass off the side of the road. I felt a heavy thump in my chest as my heart reacted to the dump of adrenalin, and my legs began pumping hard against the ground.

  I wasn’t sure if I heard myself screaming or if it was simply the whistle of the oncoming train as I sprinted madly toward Felicity’s motionless form.

  CHAPTER 25:

  What I heard wasn’t just me screaming, nor was it only the whistle of the train. It was both. A pair of disharmonic tones blended into a single horrific chord. I don’t know what it was that I was screaming, but my guttural shriek had joined with the blast of the air horn to shatter the pre-dawn calm.

  It could have been the word ‘no’. It could have been Felicity’s name. I might have been calling for Ben. A flagrant curse aimed at the Dark Mother wasn’t out of the realm of possibility either. Perhaps it was even all of them at once, I really cannot say.

  The simple fact was that the chilling wail was just exactly that— an unintelligible cry of lament in a single drawn out breath. I suppose the second round would have been just as terrifying to hear as the first had it not b
een drowned out by the now overwhelming roar of the approaching freight train.

  My heart was pounding as I drove myself forward— covering the distance between Felicity and me with a burst of speed that could only have been the product of an adrenalin surge. I started backpedaling as I drew near, trying to bring myself to a stop. In the end, I literally fell in front of her, hitting the ground hard and scrambling the last foot or so on my hands and knees.

  As I crawled, my ears were filled with the thunder of the diesel engine. The cacophony was punctuated by the rhythmic clack of the locomotive wheels against track as the southbound freight train started across the trestle above.

  Slipping my arms behind my wife’s back, I pulled her up and hugged her close. Hot tears were already streaming down my face as every ounce of the fear and dread I had been holding at bay was now bleeding out of me in an emotional hemorrhage.

  Her body was warm to the touch and I buried my face against her neck, stroking her hair as my own body shuddered in an off-kilter cadence with my heavy sobs. My very soul was rending itself into nothingness as I spiraled into darkened despair. I couldn’t even find the energy to curse Cerridwen for taking her from me, nor myself for allowing it to happen.

  All I could do was cry.

  The last thing I expected to feel were her arms slowly wrapping across my back.

  In my head, I could have sworn I heard the lilting Celtic tone of her faint voice saying, “Aye, Rowan, it’s okay…”

  My first thought was that she had now joined the voices of the dead. It only stood to reason that she would speak to me from beyond the veil. And, of course, the whispers of those on the other side had become such an integral part of my life these past few years that I was rarely surprised when they made themselves known.

  My second thought, when I considered the pressure I believed I felt against my back, was that the inevitable had arrived without delay. I had stepped over the edge and was officially insane.