As Rory stared at him, the man raised his arms. The mining tools were gone, and in their place the man held a revolver. Rory tried to run but his feet were stuck to the rocky floor. The man fixed his gaze on him, and as he watched, the man’s eyes rolled up into his head, and his skin turned molten red and black as it fell from his face in flecks. Blood dripped down off the man’s skull as his jawbones clacked together, rotten teeth forming a ghostly chatter. Then the jaws opened wide and screams ripped through a gaping hole, tearing through the tunnel like a windstorm.
The cave disappeared, and Rory was suddenly standing behind the cabin, only it was the original one-room cabin that Barton had built, with the tall chimney and rough-hewn walls, and an outhouse at the edge of the clearing. Gray matter covered the walls, the substance shifting as if it were alive. Rory walked around the cabin and stood on the path leading up to it.
He started up to the front door, but stopped when he heard a noise behind him. He turned and looked out over the lake. He saw no boats, and heavy clouds hung low over the water, obscuring the buildings on the other shore. The sound intensified, a cacophony of voices shrieking at him. Then, bluish bodies broke the clear surface of the water, ghouls with sunken faces and arms hanging limply at their sides. They glided toward him, their piercing cries coming from deep within their souls.
Rory rolled into a sitting position, the sheets rumpled underneath him, his breaths coming in short gasps. He looked at the clock. Just after eleven in the morning. He got up and went into the bathroom, splashed water on his face, then went into the kitchen.
He tried to analyze the dream while he made coffee. Running into Old Man Brewster must’ve triggered it, he thought as he waited for the coffee to brew. Once it was ready, he poured a cup and took it to the table, sitting down facing the window where he could look out beyond the porch and over the rocky shore, all the way toward Taylor Crossing.
He understood that in the dream he was the miner, with the garb and tools. In the day since he’d been here, he’d heard stories about Barton supposedly mining somewhere near the cabin, and he was curious about where the mine was, if it existed at all. That must’ve crept into his subconscious and come out in the dream, he thought as he took a sip of coffee.
His hands grew clammy as he thought of the cave and tunnels. He set the cup down and rubbed his palms on his jeans, hoping the flashback he was having would be wiped away with the sweat on his hands. The mist. A tunnel that turned into a mist. But the darkness of the mist, its very essence that begged for light, brought fear to him even now.
He took a few deep breaths and forced himself to think rationally. It wasn’t hard to tie that part of the dream to what he’d seen in New York, right before the car struck him. That evil he’d seen was the same one in the dream. Was it coming to visit him again? It felt like that right now. He thought about what Brewster said. They’re coming. Who? Those ghouls coming out of the lake? And what in the world did all this have to do with him? Strange things were going on in his own life, he knew that, but he couldn’t explain any of it or see if it related to Taylor Crossing.
He got up and went outside. The temperature was rising, even in the shade of the tree branches that hung over the porch. Something about the heat bothered him, but he couldn’t think what. Then he remembered. The article he’d read in the New York Public Library mentioned that it was unseasonably hot at the time that the townspeople disappeared. Did it mean anything that it was so hot now?
Too many weird things were happening to him. The voices, the dream. Old Man Brewster’s ravings about strange things happening and mysterious stuff coming. He wanted to chalk it all up to coincidence, but he couldn’t.
“What the hell did that old man mean?” he muttered, flinging the dregs from his coffee cup onto the dirt off the porch.
He went back inside and grabbed some of the research material he’d been reading earlier, but he still couldn’t concentrate. One has to gather them first, the old man’s words seemed to supplant the words on the page he held. Who gathers whom?
He was sitting at the table in the kitchen, staring pensively into space, when he thought he heard a noise, someone calling him. Only it sounded like it came from a great distance away. He stopped and listened. He could hear his heart thud in his ears.
He got up and went out on the porch. The boats on the dock were still there, far off, and a breeze rustled the water into an uneven, dune-like surface. He stood perfectly still, but no boats approached and no one called out to him.
“I’m going crazy,” he muttered, going back into the cabin.
Then he stopped cold. He heard it again, almost a whisper, just beyond his hearing. He turned around and surveyed the living room area. Everything was the way it had been since he first got there.
He walked through the room and into the hall. And then he heard it a third time. A voice, almost crying, in the distance, but he couldn’t make out any words.
“Who’s there?” he said to the emptiness, waiting a minute. He thought he heard something, an answer maybe, and then it was gone. He flashed on a memory, Broadway near Times Square. Then it too was gone. He laughed uneasily. “Now I sound like the people I write about.” But he knew he heard something. And it shook him.
Geez, he thought. Brewster was right. The old man’s words replayed in his mind: They’ll try and get you. They’ll call for you.
Who?
CHAPTER 11
The spirit had come from the ancient days after the Great Flood, surviving in this plane, striving for the next. And now it was more than a presence. It had become flesh and blood, its evil intertwined with Ed Miller. It had awareness of this present world. It was within this time and space. And yet it knew of other times and other spaces, ethereal memories woven within the soul of the man. They were one now, and with this body, the spirit could begin to achieve its goal of entering that other space, of being released from its captivity in this realm.
Ed stood in the middle of a clearing in the woods, controlled by the force that had taken over. He faced toward the sun that shone like a beacon in the blue heavens. It burned intensely, a full orb observing the scene below, while the giant pine trees watched over what was about to occur. A sudden breeze stirred the dry grass at his feet while the rest of the woods stayed eerily still.
Ed knelt down and closed his eyes, breathing slowly, willing himself into an empty state where only he and the spirit resided. Past and present merged. Then the man sat back on his haunches. He was unaware of the moving grass. The smell of pine and dry dirt did not penetrate his near-catatonic state. The remote cry of a frightened animal meant nothing to him.
He began to visualize. First an abyss bathed in total blackness, a cavernous grave. Then water rushing over it like an eternal seal. Out of that blackness came a wave of spectral beings, shadows flying in the night. And finally, evil. A malevolence with all the powers of darkness at hand.
Ed opened his eyes. He stared into the sky with a vacuous gaze. The air around him turned hot and void of substance, as if the oxygen, carbon dioxide and other elements had been sucked away. It had no smell, other than of death. The noises of the woods grew silent, retreating from the threat of evil that invaded the forest. The man inhaled the dead air. Then he beckoned for the evil to come.
Darkness flowed into the sky above him. The sun was blotted out behind the menacing shadows. In the small clearing, a whirlwind of fire sprang up from the center of the clearing and surrounded him, whipping about him furiously. Then, just as quickly as it appeared, the maelstrom swirled up into the blue above, a quick flash in time. The air remained stale, and the sounds of the forest were silenced. But the presence of evil lingered. And man and spirit knew.
They were coming.
CHAPTER 12
Old Man Brewster ambled along Main Street, cursing at the cars lined up along the shore of Taylor Lake.
Damn these people, he thought to himself. Don’t know any better than to come to this godforsaken place. He
halted and stared out at a fisherman in a wooden boat, his legs dangling out into the water, fishing pole waving back and forth in a poor attempt to attract fish.
“Don’t know nothin’, do ya,” Brewster muttered to himself. His white cotton shirt stuck to him, wet patches under his arms and on his back. Hotter than hell, he thought, drying his lined face with his shirttail.
And then he saw it. Over the hillside from the Crossing, darkness rocketed out of the sky like a black tornado that was suddenly sucked into the atmosphere, disappearing in an instant. He felt a jolt of pure evil hit him, coming out of nowhere, knocking him nearly senseless for a moment. He swore savagely. It’s started, he thought. He wiped sweat from his face again. And they’re takin’ the moisture right outta the air. A car drove by, nearly running him over, coating him with dust. He coughed harshly.
All these damn people, he thought again. He squinted and watched the car disappear up the road.
He heard snickering and turned to notice a group of hikers outside the general store eyeing him curiously. He waved a bony hand dismissively at them, noticing that their looks turned slightly mean. Fools, he thought, hitching his jeans up. Don’t know what they’re doing up here. They should watch out.
“Don’t know what you’re doing here anyway,” he said out loud. They all turned and busied themselves with loading their backpacks, stealing glances at him over their shoulders. One of the girls in the group laughed, then quickly covered her mouth.
“Ha!” Brewster gloated, thinking he’d embarrassed her.
Another car drove up Main Street, parking at the Silver Dollar Café. A family of four got out and went inside. Daddy was right, he thought. Give any fool an excuse, and they’ll come running to this place. Even if they could smell the danger, they’d still come. These days they flocked here for the lake and the hiking. But Brewster remembered his daddy talking about his daddy, and how all the fool people came because of the gold. Even when there wasn’t any more to be found, they still came. Smelling that ore. Hoping to strike it rich. But hoping to be rich and dying poor were two different things, at least that’s how Brewster saw it.
He stared out over the mountains at the mine tailings speckled amongst the trees. Ever since he’d come back to the Crossing all those years ago, he’d wondered about this place. He knew people looked at him like he was a shovel-full short of filling a hole, but he was smarter than he appeared. He’d returned because he hated big cities, hated people, their music, their barking dogs, and their car noise. The damn noise. But now he had come to an understanding. All these years living here, and he finally knew why his daddy never wanted to come back to the Crossing, why he preferred living in his broken-down trailer outside of Nederland.
Brewster shook his head, not noticing that the hikers were making their way toward him. All those years growing up, listening to his daddy rant and rave. He knew that talk his daddy gave years ago, could hear it like it was yesterday.
When the early morning cold begins to carry an edge with it, you know that soon the leaves will color and die. It was then, his daddy said, that you had to watch for them.
Watch for who? Brewster would always ask.
Your granddaddy wasn’t such a fool, Brewster’s daddy would say. It weren’t no ghosts, and he wasn’t crazy. He knew what had happened, by the Good Book he did. Your granddaddy didn’t have regular schooling like some folks, but he knew how to tell when things weren’t right. He could feel it in his bones.
Brewster would stare at his daddy, hoping one day he would understand.
You just watch yourself, boy. You got that mean streak just like your granddaddy.
Do not.
You do, his daddy would nod knowingly. You can be an angry cuss. But you got all your granddaddy in you. Then Brewster’s daddy would poke his finger right into the little boy’s chest, thumping him hard. You got all your granddaddy, he’d repeat. And don’t you forget it. He knew things, and so will you.
What things?
Never you mind. Get on out and do your chores before I tan your hide.
And Brewster would go, before he got a belt on his backside. Far as he was concerned, his daddy had inherited that mean streak, too. But he’d never say so.
Brewster wiped a hand over his face to clear the memory and squinted at the lake. The glare of the sun bounced off the surface like burning darts. He could hear the hikers as they moved by him, whispering. He turned to look at them again. They didn’t even bother to not stare now. Just gawked at him.
Would those hikers be needed? He glanced at the sky, where the blackness had been moments before. The first, the gatherer, was already at work. But there would be other roles to fill. They needed one who prepares the dead, and one with the message. He wrinkled his brow. There would be more, but his mind had gone blank, washed clean by the fear that sent a chill through him.
One of the hikers laughed, pulling Brewster from his thoughts. Would that man fulfill one of those roles? He narrowed his eyes, studying them. What did they know, stupid fools. Going up in the mountains when things were about to happen. He knew it, just like his daddy said he would. Like his grandfather knew things. He could feel it in his bones.
He hurried up the road, headed for his cabin. As he did, a passage from Genesis came to mind: “The Nephilim were on the earth in those days – and also afterward.” And also afterward – it kept playing in his mind, a mantra for the evil that lay ahead.
CHAPTER 13
Anna was sitting in a chair beside her dad outside of the general store, fanning herself with a folded piece of newspaper, watching the activity along Main Street when Myrtle Hester walked up, Boo trudging along beside her.
“Howdy, folks,” Myrtle said, coming up the steps onto the porch. The dog showed his age, limping behind. “How’s business?” She took a hanky out of her pocket and dabbed at her glistening nose.
“We can’t complain,” Anna said, standing up and opening the door for Myrtle. “We had the usual lunch rush, but it’s been slow for a while now.”
Myrtle patted Boo’s head and he sat down on the porch. “I won’t account for much, I’m afraid,” she said as she came into the store and went directly to a refrigerator section at the back. “I ran out of milk.” Anna could see the glass door opening and closing and then Myrtle came up to the counter.
“Dollar ninety-eight,” Anna said, ringing up the milk.
“Sure is hot out,” Myrtle complained as she pulled her wallet out of a tiny purse she kept in a fanny pack around her waist. “I wonder how good the fishing is right now.”
That prompted a thought for Anna. “You know, I haven’t seen Ed Miller since this morning.”
Myrtle raised her eyebrows. “Now that’s unusual.”
“I know. He comes in every day for cigarettes, first thing in the morning, then comes back around lunch for another pack.”
“Don’t know why he doesn’t stock up on them,” Myrtle observed. “It’d save him the trips here.”
Anna shrugged. “Beats me. Unless he started buying them somewhere else.”
Myrtle clicked her tongue. “You know better than that. Ed Miller rarely leaves the Crossing. He probably drank way too much, and he went home to sleep it off.”
“Maybe,” Anna said, raising an eyebrow skeptically. Even drunk or hung over, Ed always made it into the store. Anna bagged the milk and set it on the counter.
Myrtle eyed her. “He was in this morning?”
“Yes, like clockwork.”
“Well, I wouldn’t worry about him,” Myrtle said slowly. “He’s an old pain in the ass, just like me. He probably made a wicked batch of that homemade hooch, and he’s paying for it now.”
“I’m sure you’re right.” Anna smiled, knowing how much Myrtle liked to keep an eye on everyone in town. She gave new meaning to the term ‘busybody’. “No point in my worrying about him anyway,” Anna said. “I’ve got enough of that with Dad.”
“Jimmy doesn’t look so good,” Myrtle said in he
r direct way, but underneath the façade, concern lingered.
“He could be better,” Anna acknowledged. “His hearing’s getting worse. But he likes sitting out there, and he’s not bothering anyone.”
“That’s a fact.” Myrtle took the milk. “You take care of yourself, you hear?”
“Always,” Anna said.
Travis Velario entered the store and Myrtle almost laughed at the frown that washed over Anna’s face. Myrtle escaped so she didn’t have to endure Travis. She didn’t know why Anna didn’t put her foot down and tell Travis to leave her alone, but she didn’t understand a lot of what young people did these days. She shook her head. That was Anna’s problem.
• • •
Myrtle retrieved Boo and walked west down Main Street, wishing she’d remembered to put on her bonnet. The heat seemed almost unbearable today, and she hated the sticky sweat under her arms, and the rivulets of moisture that squirreled their way down her back. She had been unable to run from the vague gloominess that had settled in her bones since she had awoken, and the heat wasn’t helping her mood.
Out on Taylor Lake, a number of boats drifted in the water, and the occasional voice echoed back to Myrtle. She couldn’t understand why anyone would want to sit out there, bored and hot, but to each his own, she thought. A number of cars were lined up along the shore, and others near the antique store and café. Winter would be upon them quicker than they could blink, and the town would be almost abandoned for another season.
She passed the café. Joan Friedman was wiping up one of the few outside tables. Near her, a young couple with a baby in a stroller sat at another table, maximizing the shade provided from an awning sprouting out from the side of the café.
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