Tatters of the King (The Warren Brood Book 3)
Page 7
But when the rush of the kill recedes, I am left staring at the work of a murderer. The shattered beads lie upon the ground, trampled, and I hear the shouts of the hunting party not far from the hut. I see their torches peering from between the branchlets of the willow thicket. And it is then that I know that I have been trapped by the conniving medicine men.
I realize with horror that my bloodline’s prestige will not be able to save me this time.
Chapter 5
Between the Lines
Chelsea was waiting with Amanda’s mother on the living room couch. After weeks of toiling research that had her family and friends worried sick about her mental health, Amanda had at last announced she was ready to present her findings about that weird book they’d found the night of the fire. But she was still making final preparations in the next room, and so Chelsea found herself staring at the muted television, where political pundits were slamming their opponents with surely witty rhetoric. Beside the couch, Amanda’s father reclined in his easy chair, his eyes glued to the voiceless marionettes on the screen.
In the center of the living room, beside the TV, Amanda had set up a small whiteboard. Colorful magnets held scraps of paper and old documents in place, and a web of pins and yarn connected various bits of interest. Alleged interest, in any case.
“She’s really been busy, hasn’t she?” Amanda’s mother remarked as she looked at all the documents plastered on the board. “Do you have any idea what this is about?”
“Hell if I know,” Chelsea said in a bitter tone, chin on her fist. “Every time I ask her, she just goes off on some muttering tangent about old books and crap.” And come to think of it, why don’t you know what this is all about? She must’ve been talking your ear off about this for weeks, right?
Finally, after what felt like hours of waiting, Amanda entered with a thick book and several rolls of paper tucked under her arm. Dark circles spread under her green eyes from long nights at the library and historical society. She placed the documents on the table with a small grunt and looked up at her audience. “Alright. Sorry to keep you waiting. Everyone ready for this?”
Her father chuckled, though his concern was apparent in the hard lines of his face. “Sure. Lay it on us.”
Chelsea fell back into the couch with far less amusement and crossed her arms. “Yeah, let’s hear it. What’s this whole thing about?” Sooner this is over with, sooner you can go back to being normal again. Chelsea didn’t want to admit that she’d been lonely, but with her best friend locked in her room for the whole summer, she’d found herself going to her twin brother Chad of all people for company—and if that wasn’t sad, then what the hell was?
Amanda wiped her eyes and walked over to the whiteboard. She pinned up a final batch of papers and gestured to the top document. It looked like it had been thoroughly stained by coffee. “Okay, so, let’s start at the beginning. It is commonly believed that Grantwood was founded in 1855 by a man unimaginitively named Jebediah Woodrow Grant. However, after combing the historical records, I’ve come to the conclusion that this man never existed, and was actually a pseudonym used by a Sir Charles Repton, who was contracted to survey for gold in the Sierra Nevadas. However, instead of finding gold,” she said, pausing for dramatic effect, “he found the ruins of an ancient civilization. He was apparently so taken by the discovery that he shirked his duties and spent several years studying and cataloguing the things in the ruins. Grantwood, specifically the silver mine in Old Town, was founded under an assumed name to help fund his ongoing research while throwing his unhappy sponsors off his trail.”
Her parents seemed skeptical, but were quiet as she spoke. Chelsea blinked at her in confusion. “What?”
Amanda shook her head. “Okay, so, his son, Charles Repton the Second, became obsessed with the mythology of that old civilization, and was convinced that he was the chosen one for this spider-deity figure.”
Her mother looked confused. “Spider deity?”
“I’ll get to that. But anyway, after his father’s death in 1876, Charles Repton the Second recompiled his father’s research, the Book of Ur’thenoth, adding his own interpretations and ramblings.”
Chelsea recognized this portion of the lecture, though the first part about Sir Charles Repton and the ancient civilization was entirely new to her. “This is when he went crazy, right? The son, I mean.”
“Right. After he recompiled it into this volume, the Repton Scriptures,” she said, gesturing at the top book of her stack, “he began to recruit others into his congregation. This is how the cult known as the Websworn was started. By 1882, it had a membership of just around twenty-five people.”
Her father’s expression grew dark.
“The book says that the ruins of the underground civilization that Repton’s father found, which he called Ur’thenoth, was the cult’s holy land. It was where they went to hold their rituals and rites and whatnot.”
“So, wait, hold on a second,” Chelsea said, blinking at the board. “This nonsense is interesting and all, but unless I’m mistaken this entire theory hinges on the idea that Grantwood is built atop some ancient ruined civilization. And if that were true, then why the hell hasn’t anyone found it before?”
“I’m getting to that,” Amanda said in an exhausted tone. “Okay, anyway, by 1897 some of the later books were added to this collection, including those indicating that Repton the Younger wanted to carry out the ambition of the legendary spider king.”
“Wasn’t it a spider god?” her mother asked.
Amanda fumbled for words. “There’s the spider god, and then there’s his avatar, or something. For now just think of it as Spider God and Spider Jesus. Anyway, the ambition of Spider Jesus—who they called the Yellow King—was to create a master race.” She paused again for effect. “A race of human-spider hybrids.”
Chelsea’s breath caught in her chest. This was all new, too.
“Based on what I can gather from the letters and dates in the second half of the Repton Scriptures, it appears the cult began to follow this edict of the King somewhere around the turn of the century. Okay, next, you were asking about why nobody knows about any of those ruins if they really exist? Well, I took the liberty of comparing some of the maps that Repton drew, mapping out the tunnels that he explored.” She unfurled an enlarged copy of one of the maps and pinned it to the board on top of several other photocopied documents. “Okay, so this is kind of hard to read, but you can get the sense of where some things are.”
Chelsea stared at the spiderweb of black lines and labels. “Okay, so what’s the secret?”
Amanda unfurled another roll of paper, this time a modern map of the city. “Compare where the exit tunnels occur.” She gestured at some red circles marked on the first map before she overlaid the modern one. “Look. You can see Widow’s Creek cutting through right here, so we can use that to orient it in the proper direction, get it all lined up.”
Chelsea felt a chill when she noticed the horrified fascination with which Amanda’s father was watching.
Amanda placed two pins in the exit tunnels. “Okay, there. Notice anything about where those entrances are? Start with this one here.”
Her father nodded. “That’s Parson’s Grove, isn’t it?”
Oh my god, you’re taking this seriously? Chelsea thought. You’re joking. This is insane.
“That’s right,” Amanda said with a relieved nod.
“Wait,” Chelsea said. “But, if that’s Parson’s Grove, then that must mean that . . . ”
Amanda nodded. “This tunnel should break the surface near San Solano.”
Chelsea sat up straight at the mention of the legendary haunt. Goose bumps prickled at her naked arms.
“Now,” Amanda said, “that’s nothing special on its own, but check out where the second one is.” Again she gestured at the pin. “Not too far away, but if you chart out the distance and direction, this second pin comes out right under the Golmont Corporation building.”
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br /> Chelsea scoffed. “Oh. No wonder they fell apart. Must’ve been like building your house on an Indian graveyard.”
Amanda shook her head, her irritation apparent. “I pulled some old documents at town hall and the library. Turns out San Solano was built and maintained by Low Foothill Correctional Services, a company founded by a man named David Hatrup. The Golmont Corporation was originally founded around the same time by a man named Thomas Golmont. Both men are listed as members of the Websworn,” she said, pointing to the photocopied membership roster peeking out from beneath the maps. “So what I’m thinking is that San Solano and the Golmont Corporation were created specifically to hide those tunnels. So nobody could ever find their secret.”
Her mother gave her a skeptical look. “That’s a pretty big investment just to hide some tunnels. And what does any of that have to do with the Norwegian Killer?” Chelsea was relieved to hear a note of incredulity in the woman’s voice.
“Ahh. Right. Okay, so, back to Repton the Younger.” Amanda tore the map down and gestured at the man’s name and commissioned portrait on the board. “In 1915, he claimed to have been able to enter another world—the world where his Spider Jesus supposedly lived. And the revelations he received there are among the last things that were added to the book. Some of the letters and manuscripts point toward the fact that he became something of an iconoclast. His views were not exactly well-received by the rest of the Websworn.”
Chelsea laughed a dry sound. “What views are these exactly? That Spider Jesus is really three people and didn’t return from the dead after all?”
Amanda glared at her. “Specifically, Repton believed that the heir to the Spider Kingdom could be created not by occult magics, but through the power of science. He believed that whatever strange machinery he found in that other world could be used to artificially create these human-spider hybrids they wanted. Whereas the Websworn up until then believed the heir would be born in the same way the Yellow King himself had—”
Chelsea grimaced. “Jesus Christ, who cares what the difference is?”
“We do,” Amanda snapped. “God, fuck the details. The point is there was a fundamental schism in the cult, and their self-proclaimed god-pope didn’t like being in the minority. Got it?”
“Yes, I got it, Christ.”
Half of a yawn took control of Amanda’s face. “Okay, so, more information from the later writings: Repton took on an apprentice in 1920. Someone to carry on his vision of the spider cult when he died. That apprentice’s name? Johnathan Griffith.”
Amanda’s father and mother both gasped. Chelsea, on the other hand, just gave her a blank stare. “Who was that again?”
“The fucking judge who presided over the Norwegian Killer’s trial!” She took a deep breath. “It took another fifty years, but Griffith went on to take up the mantle of the leader of the order, a position that they called the Helixweaver. Tensions escalated over that time. Then, in the 1970s, we finally have the Norwegian Killer incident.” She gestured to the two lists of names hanging on the board. “This here is the official list of the deceased and missing from the incident. Twenty-seven dead, twenty-four missing. And this is the membership roster of the Websworn as it looked in 1971, taken from this book. Seventy-five names. Every single one of the Norwegian Killer’s victims—dead or missing—was a member of this cult. And among the names that aren’t accounted for in the victims: Johnathan Griffith, the confirmed Helixweaver; Simon Dwyre, the man who would become the CEO of the Golmont Corporation; Rudolph Paine, appointed police chief of Mount Hedera in 1998; Alexander Tanner, mayor of Widow’s Creek; and Matthew motherfucking Parson!”
Chelsea stared at her, mouth falling open. “Wait a minute. Then . . . oh my God, so, wait, that means that the Norwegian Killer was . . . ”
Amanda nodded. Her emerald eyes sparkled with a hint of relief. “The Norwegian Killer incident was the result of internal strife in the Websworn. It would be easy to chalk it up to a zealous mass-homicide, but that would be ignoring the evidence. Twenty-seven dead, twenty-four completely missing. Let’s read between the lines, here. Every single name on that cult roster who survived the Norwegian Killer incident, and who lived to 2013, was killed during the lockdown. That definitively proves the link between the lockdown, the cult, and the Norwegian Killer. The lockdown murders were a replay of the Norwegian Killer incident, and that makes the final point clear: the Norwegian Killer as the media portrays him never even existed. He was an invention to explain how the cult thinned its ranks of all those who opposed the ideals of Repton the Younger.”
Chelsea stared at her, dumbstruck. And a glance to either side found even Amanda’s parents’ incredulity dismantled.
“Now,” Amanda said, “that brings us to one little problem. What about the twenty-four missing? Well, in examining the writings, there’s a clear impression that both Repton the Younger and Griffith viewed the opposition within the cult as either existentially dangerous or heretical. Those who were dangerous were the ones they killed. The others, those who were just heretical, who were considered unworthy but perhaps still useful—direct quote—became the missing. It seems that for some reason, Repton and his ilk needed the rest of them alive. What does that add up to?”
Chelsea shrugged. “I don’t know. What happened to them?”
Amanda shook her head. “I’m not sure. This was Grandpa’s copy of the Scriptures, so anything that was added after his disappearance is a mystery. But I have this gut feeling. I just feel like those people, those Websworn who opposed Griffith, must have been banished into the ruins of that old spider-worshiping civilization. The Golmont Corporation and San Solano already held the keys to the kingdom, so to speak, and that meant they could keep them trapped there without directly spilling their tainted blood. And if Repton still needed them for something, that would fit as well.”
Amanda’s mother looked mortified. “That’s terrible.”
Her father got up and made his way to the makeshift bulletin board. “Websworn.” He looked over the list of the dead and the roster from the cursed book. He nodded with a vacant expression. “I can’t believe it, Mandy. You were right.”
“Th-thanks. I’ve been working a bit too hard on this, I guess.”
“I can see you really did your research.” An aura of regret rolled off him. “You’d make a fine detective.” He leaned in close to the texts on the board, as though inspecting them for historical accuracy. “That book was the key after all, I guess. No matter how much I searched, without it I could never have found those answers.” He chuckled a dry sound. “Such a waste.”
“Dad?”
“It’s closure,” he said. “Of some kind. Thank you.”
“Y-yeah. Of course.”
Chelsea stared at her with a confusion that had only deepened from the revelation. “So, that’s it?”
Amanda gave her a puzzled look. For a moment, she looked like she would fall asleep where she stood. “What do you mean?”
“That’s all you found out?”
Ponderous, Amanda’s dad turned to Chelsea. “This is huge. This changes everything.”
Chelsea was about to dispute the point, but something dawned upon her in a flash. Stricken by her own revelation, she jumped to her feet. In disbelief, she studied the lines in her best friend’s face. “You didn’t do all of this just to unravel some conspiracy, did you? You didn’t spend two months camping in the library just to bust open an urban legend.”
Amanda grew quiet. Her parents were looking at her now as well. She wandered over to a vacant chair and collapsed into it. For a long moment, she stared into the beige carpet, wrapped in a contemplative silence. “You must understand,” she said. “The declaration of martial law. That monster at Spinneretta’s house. Those gunmen in the coats. The fire at the Golmont Corporation. Spinneretta and her family. The cult of the Websworn. Grandpa. They’re all connected. And I think I’ve proven that beyond any reasonable doubt. And you know what that means, right?”
Amanda gave a small nod. “The forces that caused the lockdown. They weren’t normal. Something supernatural caused it.” She moved her gaze to meet Chelsea’s. “What happened here was planned, just as the Norwegian Killer murders were. And now that Spins and her family are gone, I think they were being pursued. The cult was after them. The lockdown wasn’t for us; it was for them. It makes sense, doesn’t it? They wanted human-spider hybrids, after all.”
The room was quiet. Chelsea began to absentmindedly pluck at her hair. “So . . . what now?”
Conviction shone in Amanda’s eyes. “If the powers that be are still around, then what happened here could happen again. We need to find Spins and her family. Not just because she’s our friend. But because I think she’s the key to this whole thing.”
It was Tuesday evening, and Spinneretta again found herself at the library. Most of her free time was now spent here, embroiled in research. Since arriving in Lake Cormorant, she’d found herself delving deep into the modest selection of occult literature the library held. Her love of mythology had been replaced by the desire to explore even the craziest rumors for whispers of the truth. Now, she wished only to understand the perverse world that had birthed her.
More than two dozen books had fallen before her thirst for knowledge since she’d started reading here. Most were of the Great Togetherness variety, New Age self-help crap written to finagle a dime from those seeking easy answers. Those weren’t even worth the paper they were printed on, pleasant though the escapist fantasies may have been. However, there were a number of books that were sufficiently dark and despair-ridden that, while perhaps not believable, at least passed the first litmus test.