—R. Ericson”
The note was dated the first of March, 1940. It appeared that either the police station from that era had never gotten their annex, or else this Mr. Ericson had forgotten entirely.
The rest were police reports and old evidence photographs I really had no desire to see. There were also copies of draft letters and death notifications from the Second World War. Then the First.
Another handwritten letter, yellow and brittle. I handled it with caution and set it on the desk rather than let my finger oils damage it. The date in the corner read “November 17, 1915.”
I scanned the body of the letter, that familiar gripping feeling of dread arising in my stomach as I did so. “Maggie? Gordon? You should see this.”
They appeared at my side, each looking over one of my shoulders. Gordon patted his shirt pocket and rolled his eyes. “That’s some small print. One of you mind reading it out loud?”
“That’s fine,” I said, swallowing hard and trying to stop trembling.
“Dear Timothy,
It feels so silly writing to you about this. How far gone am I that the only person to whom I desire to speak has already gone before the Lord? But the words fly about within me. And the high, singing voice rings in my head over and over, telling me that all is lost and I am unfit. I fear that if I do not get the words out on paper, I will dash my head open on these bars to let them free.
Grunwald has fallen to hysteria, and I will soon join them if this situation is not resolved. The Grim Halberdier has taken his fifth victim. Angus Branchett claims to have identified the man behind the ghastly moniker, and his men are on the hunt this night. I silently curse this town’s love affair with sending its young men to join the Army, especially now that preparations for entry into Europe’s war keep them all so far from home. All we have left to protect this town from invaders are the elderly and infirm. If you were still here, my love, I know this killer would be in the ground by now.
I fear the madness may have already taken me. I cry out for the boy that used to visit from the forest, that noble beast, the timid Leviathan. He comes no more and I am afraid the Grim Halberdier has finally found him. I have tried to fulfill the boy’s request to go to him if I ever call and he does not appear. But the police have prohibited any and all access to the woods for fear of the killer. For disregarding their orders, I now sit in their cell.
I have tried to convince them that I must enter the woods. Perhaps foolishly, I told them about the dreams. I told them the words the boy spoke to me about my connection to the bear. I must go to the boy so that the bear can appear. Otherwise, the man in the woods will not be stopped. I have given the police my best drawing of the boy so they might locate and rescue him, but they laugh at me. Our dullard of a mayor puts ridiculous ideas in people’s heads, spinning my claims into tall tales and wicked spells. I know it’s that awful moneylender Crayford whispering in his ear. The workmen call me ‘bruja,’ the rest of the townfolk just say it plainly to my face—witch.
So I pray that Branchett and his band of elderly deputies, who run about as if they were children with cap-guns playing cowboy, can live up to their big talk. It is all I can do. All any of us can do to affect the outcome is pray.
I hope that you are well. I find myself hoping that I join you soon. Perhaps, if things keep heading out of control, I will not have to wait long. I take comfort in knowing that none of this concerns you, as you are safe in the hands of God.
All My Love,
Muriel.”
I tried to take a long breath. My heart was pounding. I struggled to slow my breathing. Just to do something other than sit there, I produced my phone and took a picture of the letter.
“Muriel,” Maggie mused. “I don’t think I ever heard of anyone from here by that name.”
“If they decided she was a witch, they may have driven her out of the town or otherwise scrubbed her name off the records,” Gordon said. “But we’ll have to keep looking to be sure. Bless her.”
I forced myself to listen to their words, straining to focus on something other than my churning panic.
Maggie tapped the corner of the page. “Look at the date. November seventeenth, 1915. That’s a hundred years to the day from tomorrow.”
“The Axe-Man will sleep a hundred years,” said Gordon. “Or so the story goes. If that was his fifth victim, this letter may have been written the night the sheriff shot him. I have to wonder if these kids getting lost has to do with that. Perhaps a deranged copycat.”
“Or the man himself,” Maggie intoned.
“She mentions having dreams,” I muttered. “I’ve been having them, too.”
“Talk to us about them, Kelly,” Maggie said, putting a hand on my shoulder. The comforting warmth of her palm broke me out of panic mode. I could breathe again.
As best I could, I told them what I could recall. Not much detail. Just being in the woods. Looking for something. Feeling enraged, unstoppable.
“And both you and her say you’ve seen a boy that was never mentioned in the myth,” Maggie said after a minute of thought. “It’s obvious that the stories hold the answer you’re looking for.”
“Why do you say that?”
“Think about it, Kelly. Remember the myth. Consider the sentiment in the letter. You’ve heard Garrett tell the story to you just as many times as Gordon told it to him. The answer is there.”
I put my shaking hand on my chest and thought about Garrett’s voice in the museum. “OK. I’m trying.”
Maggie gave a gentle laugh. “What did this woman do when she couldn’t stop the killer?”
“Pray. And write to her dead husband.”
“And what does the mother bear do if she can’t handle the situation by herself?”
I frowned. “I don’t think…”
“Even though his mission takes him far away,” Gordon said, “the wolf will drop everything and rush to his wife’s side if she calls for him.”
I looked at my trembling hand and the cell phone clutched in it. “OK. I’ll step outside, I guess.”
“Go on home after that,” said Maggie. “You’ve done enough. We’re going to keep looking. This letter has a few good leads in it.”
I nodded. “I’d like that. Thank you. Call me if there’s anything else.”
“Will do, dear. Tell Garrett we said hi.”
The cold air outside didn’t help my shivering, making dialing more difficult than it needed to be. I held the phone to my ear and waited.
“Hey, babe.”
“Oh, God,” I sobbed. “Garrett.”
“What?” he demanded. “What’s wrong, Kelly?”
I spilled. I told him everything. Laylah and Rachael, the dreams, the details of the ordeal with Emma Lee, my encounters with the mysterious boy, and my glimpse of the bear. He didn’t say a word during my thirty-minute monologue. He was quiet for a long time after I finished. When he spoke again, the words came out slow and measured.
“Kelly, get some sleep.”
I damn near exploded. “What? Don’t tell me you think I’m crazy too! I’ve put up with you leaving me alone out here for almost two years because I believe my husband is still inside that cracked head of yours! If you think this is the time to doubt me, then—”
“Hey. Let me finish. Go draw the curtains and lie down. You’re gonna need all the sleep you can get. It’s going to be a long night.”
“You mean…”
“I’m going to ride hard to beat this storm, but it’ll still be six or seven hours before I get there. You and I are going to have a date night in the Green Ravine.”
Chapter 20
I stirred from fitful sleep at a stubbly face kissing my cheek. Despite my anxiety, I couldn’t help but smile. “Hey.”
Garrett grinned back at me with his slightly crooked stare. “You were out for a long time.”
I rolled over and brushed my hair out of my face. “I haven’t been sleeping well lately. What time is it?”
&nb
sp; “Five thirty. I called my parents on the way and they asked me to meet them at the library when I arrived. I joined them around four, but I didn’t hang around long. Oh, and Branchett showed up at our front door the same time I did.”
I sat up sharply. “What did he want?”
“He asked me to tell you that Cotton and about a hundred people swept every inch of the forest for miles and found nothing. They’re calling the county and kicking this up the chain. There’s no trace of Laylah anywhere.”
I shook my head. “No. They’ve got to search at night. When the darkness comes.”
“That was never going to happen. And that’s why I’m here.”
I rubbed my face. “What did your parents say?”
“They just gave me this.” He reached into the pocket of his work pants and pulled out an old photograph, yellowed at the edges. He handed it over facedown. Someone had written in pencil: “Muriel Greaves, 11/17/1915.”
I flipped it over and gasped. It was a pencil sketch, faded and blurry but unmistakable. I recognized that thin face, that pointed chin, that flop of black hair.
“My mom wanted to see if you recognized that person.”
“It’s him,” I managed to say. “It’s the forest boy. He really has lived there a long time. Everything he told me was true.”
Garrett frowned. “Who’s Muriel Greaves?”
“The bruja from the story of the Axe-Man. We found a letter she wrote while she was in jail. The letter mentioned this drawing. I’m so glad they found it.”
“The witch…” Garrett’s face turned to a fearful expression I hadn’t seen him make in a long time. “So she wasn’t crazy. You’re seeing what she saw.”
I touched his arm. “The boy told me that up until the night Emma Lee and I saw the bear, she hadn’t appeared in the woods since before the Texas War for Independence. That was, what, a hundred and eighty years ago?”
“Something like that. So Momma Kodi never appeared to protect the forest or the people when the Axe-Man was doing his thing in 1915.”
“Because Muriel Greaves would have brought her if she hadn’t been thrown in prison a hundred years ago.”
Garrett sat up straighter. “The Axe-Man will sleep a hundred years,” he said in the exact same tone as his father. “We better get ready. I think it’s become more important than ever that Momma Kodi makes an appearance in the woods tonight.” He stood. I didn’t follow.
Seeing my hesitation, he touched my shoulder. “I won’t let you get hurt.”
I thought about what Pastor Cotton had told me. “It’s not that. When we get back… I want to talk about you staying home. Or at least spending more time here. I know you think the mission is far away, but I want you to consider that your mission might be here in Grunwald.”
He frowned. “Yeah, we’ll have to talk later.”
Pushing through the initial frustration, I recalled Cotton’s words about looking for the motivation. “Garrett. I know I have no idea what you went through. I know even Phil doesn’t. I understand that the only person who could have really shared your experience… didn’t come home. I get it. You think there’s no outlet for you in this town. But you’re wrong. Be right back.”
Leaving him confused in the bedroom, I went to the kitchen and rummaged through the junk drawer. I returned a second later and held the business card out to him.
He took it and looked at it closely. A cold look came over his face. “This guy is in direct competition with my dad. You hate him. Why would I call him?”
“Did you know he was a war veteran, too?”
“I think so. Why?”
“Did you know he’s handicapped because he took a bullet in Vietnam?”
The cold face changed to an intrigued one. “No, I didn’t.”
“I gave him a chance. I’m glad I did. I learned a lot from talking to him and I think you might too.”
Garrett sighed. “Alright, fine. I don’t like it, but I can tell it’s important to you. But we need to get through tonight before we think that far.”
“OK. Yes. Agreed.”
Satisfied, we went to work. I retrieved my emergency case from my car as well as the plastic sack that David Branchett had returned to me. I checked the first aid kit’s contents and put fresh batteries in the flashlight. When I returned to the bedroom, Garrett had gone into the closet and opened up our gun safe.
He came out with his shotgun, a sleek black semi-automatic twelve-gauge. Designed for bird hunting, it had a long barrel into which he was currently screwing a choke tube. He had added an oversized handle to the bolt and sawed a series of deep ridges into the forend so he could grip and load it with his prosthetic hook. The loss of his hand and damage to his eye on the right side had forced him to learn to shoot left-handed.
He had already set a handgun on the bed next to a holster and a box of .45 ammunition.
“I thought you said you couldn’t do handguns very well anymore,” I commented.
“I can’t,” he answered, not looking up from his task. “That’s for you.”
“Oh.” I wasn’t about to argue. After a couple of minutes of silent work, I had the loaded handgun holstered in the waistband of my jeans, hidden under my shirt.
“Ready?” I asked.
“Yeah. We should get going. The sun will set in a few minutes.” Garrett slung the shotgun’s strap over his shoulder, clipped a knife to his belt, stuck a roll of bandages in his pocket, and looked to the window. “You better get your coat. Here comes the rain.”
Chapter 21
Putting up the hood of my jacket did little to protect my face from the gallons of water pounding on my head and shoulders. Garrett moved ahead of me, pushing through the soaked branches, his cap pulled low, keeping his gun pointed down and tucked under his coat. The rain fell so hard I couldn’t even hear my own footsteps. Only the faintest hint of dim grey light remained in the sky for us to see by. The cold wind whipped through the trees and felt like razor blades on my cheeks.
As the ground in front of us began to slope down, Garrett stopped and beckoned as best as one can do with a hook. I came up beside him.
“There’s the riverbed,” he said. “You said it happened after dark?”
“Pretty soon after. Should I turn my flashlight on?”
“Yeah, I can’t see the other side.”
Standing close to my husband, I shined the light down ahead of us. A trickle of water, about an inch deep, flowed along the center of the river. I brought the beam up to look at the trees on the other side.
“There.” Garrett tensed. “You were right.”
“You doubted me?” I realized I had completely failed to sound confident. My hand shook, making the flashlight beam follow suit, as we watched the black fog creeping along the ground between the trees.
“Movement!” Garrett snapped, swinging his shotgun to the left. I followed with the flashlight. Someone was running down the slope.
Out of pure instinct I pushed the gun to the side. “Careful, Garrett! It’s him! That’s the boy!”
Garrett pointed the barrel to the ground and let out a sharp whistle. The boy’s head turned in our direction as his little feet splashed through the water. He veered toward us on his way uphill. I ran out to greet him, dropping to one knee and holding my jacket open to catch him.
“Kelly!” he sobbed. As if remembering himself, he pulled away, trying to shove free of my arms. “No! Get away! He’s coming!”
“Who is?” I took his thrashing head in my hands, held him still, forced him to look at me. “Who’s after you, baby?”
His rheumy eyes focused on me, his lip quivering. “The Axe-Man.”
Garrett stepped forward, scanning the trees with his shotgun again. “He’ll have to cross. He’ll be out in the open.”
“That gun won’t stop him.”
“We’ll see.”
The boy disregarded Garrett and looked at me again. “Listen, he’s got the girl. He needs us both.”
“
Slow down,” I said, wiping his sopping hair off his forehead. “What does the Axe-Man want you for?”
He took a long look at Garrett, then leaned close to me. “To give me to the Eld King.”
I withdrew. “I don’t think I understand. But explain it to me later. Where is the girl? Where’s Laylah?”
“Already on the other side, in the clearing under the gnarled cedar.”
Garrett scowled. “The twisted tree? The spot where the former King fell?”
The boy’s eyes widened. “Yes. Exactly.”
I regained his attention. “What does the Axe-Man want with Laylah?”
“I told you. Sacrifice. The Axe-Man wants to bring back the Eld King. That’s all he has ever wanted. He’ll do it tomorrow night.”
“He’s going to kill her?”
“Yes! Now get out of here! If he finds out you know about me, he won’t let you live.”
Something in me was changing again. I felt that defiance, that feeling of invincibility that had driven me to search for Emma Lee. I knew it from my dreams. The boy must have seen it, because his face furrowed with concern.
“We are not leaving, without you or Laylah,” I growled.
“You can’t fight him,” the boy whispered. Behind him, I saw the creeping mist reach the bottom of the slope and touch the middle of the riverbed.
At that instant, a bolt of lightning shot off so close to us that I was blinded for a few seconds. The thunder drilled at my ears like a firecracker popping right next to my head.
After it had faded and I could see again, I keep hearing an echoing roar. I thought my hearing had been damaged.
“Dear God in Heaven…” Garrett muttered.
I looked in the direction he was staring. Where there had been a muddy riverbed with a tiny trickle just a second before, now there was a torrent of water three or four feet deep. It moved so fast I had no doubt I’d be swept away if I set foot in there. Downstream, I could see the sharp crest of the Fangstone still reaching several feet above the surface. I took a tighter grip on the boy.
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