by Mark Lukens
The front door opened right up to the large living room, right to the horror displayed in the middle of the floor. To the right, an archway led to a hall area and bedrooms. To the left there was a dining room and then an archway to the kitchen. The walls were splattered with blood, smeared with it in some places. But one wall had been left untouched except for the word PALMER painted in large looping letters.
Palmer walked a little closer to his own last name on the wall, careful not to step in the blood on the floor. He looked at the pieces of the bodies arranged in the middle of the living room floor. Some of the living room furniture had been pushed back towards the walls to make room for the display: legs and arms intertwined around a mound of organs on top of two torsos, the heads of Harold and Marcie Watson on top, their intestines strung through everything like strings stitching up the morbid display.
“You okay?” Cardenelli asked.
Palmer had the back of his hand up to his nose, trying to breathe in the latex of the gloves to mask the smell. He breathed through his mouth, anything to block out the stench of blood, the reek of shit and piss, the rotting smell of undigested food from torn stomachs and intestines stretched so far they had split open, spilling their contents. It had been a long time since Palmer had smelled anything like this, and it was overpowering. It had also been a long time since he’d seen anything like this, and he was beginning to feel a little light-headed. He could imagine how pale and sickly he looked right now to his former agent-in-charge.
But Palmer managed to nod and clear his throat. “This is how the other victims looked?”
“Sort of,” Cardenelli said.
“What do you mean by that?”
“They were arranged sort of like this, their body parts stacked up on each other. But the first two murders were more amateurish. Not as skilled as this.”
“So he’s getting better at . . . at doing this.”
“It’s quite a jump in skill.”
“Maybe this is someone different. Another copycat.”
“Same shoeprint found at the other scenes. Same type of hiking boot. No fingerprints or hairs left behind at the other two murders, and I’m betting we won’t find any here, either. Also, the victims have similarities. All three of the older couples lived in a remote area. They had all been tied up to chairs, tortured, then killed and their bodies cut up and mutilated. But you’re right, this could be someone different. The first two could have been copycat killings, but maybe this one is the real killer.”
Palmer felt another wave of dizziness wash over him. This couldn’t be real. This couldn’t be happening again. This couldn’t be the Ancient Enemy.
“Look at the way the bodies are cut up,” Cardenelli said, pointing at the pieces with a pen clenched in his gloved fingers. “These cuts are ragged, and the bones seem to have been snapped, not sawed apart. It’s like these people weren’t even cut up, more like they were ripped apart.”
Palmer swallowed hard. He felt clammy.
“Of course we’ll get more info after forensics is done, but I can see the differences already.”
“So you think this is the work of the killer from the dig site? Or from the Mountainside Inn in Cody’s Pass?”
“Seems similar in a way. There are things done to these bodies that don’t seem physically possible for a human being to do. Just like at the Mountainside Inn. Just like the cabin. Like the bodies at the dig site in New Mexico. Maybe this killer, or killers, they took time off. Seven years for whatever that might symbolize to them. And then this copycat comes along, trying to mimic the murders and it draws the real Dig Site Killer out into the open again.”
“But you said it seems like this is the same man that killed the other two couples.”
“Yeah, but that’s just the shoe size and some of the tools used. Lots of guys wear that shoe size and that brand of hiking boot.”
Palmer sighed and stared at the wall with his last name painted on it. “But you really brought me here because of that.”
Cardenelli nodded.
Palmer knew that Cardenelli had never bought his explanation of what had happened in Cody’s Pass and then down in Arizona, how he and Captain Begay had chased a suspect hundreds of miles into the desert. He and Begay had gotten their stories straight before they were interviewed, both of them saying that the “suspect” had gotten away, even implying that the “suspect” was part of a larger group, perhaps even a cult of some kind. Begay had even suggested that the cult could be Navajo or some other Native American people. It was all Cardenelli or any of the other FBI agents had ever gotten out of him and Begay after hours of questioning. And Palmer knew Cardenelli had never been satisfied with either of their answers or their version of what had happened. Cardenelli had actually seemed relieved when Palmer told him that he wanted to retire early. It had taken some paperwork and a few okays from the top brass in the FBI, but Palmer’s request was finally granted a few weeks later.
“Could be a different Palmer,” Palmer told Cardenelli. “This might not be my name.”
Cardenelli shook his head slowly. “I don’t think so. Too much of a coincidence. You were the agent on the Dig Site case, and this is a copycat killer. I think this message is meant for you.”
Palmer couldn’t tell if Cardenelli suspected him of being involved with this somehow, or if he was worried about his safety.
It didn’t matter. Palmer was no longer an FBI agent, and he wasn’t even asked here as a consultant. He didn’t need to be here anymore. If Cardenelli was going to charge him with something, then he’d better get on with it, otherwise he was done here.
He left the house and Cardenelli followed him out, suddenly right behind him. “I want you to stay in touch with me,” Cardenelli said.
“Will do,” Palmer answered as he walked down the long driveway to his car. A forensics van was pulling up now, driving right past him.
Palmer got into his car and started it. He turned around in the driveway and left. As soon as he was on the road, he made two phone calls. One call was to his ex-wife Teresa, and the other to Eliza. He only got Teresa’s voicemail so he left a message for her. But Eliza answered the phone and Palmer told her about the recent copycat killings. He told her someone had painted his last name on the walls. He begged her and the kids to take a vacation for a while, somewhere far away.
At least Eliza sounded scared, and he hoped to God she was going to take his advice.
CHAPTER 9
David
Iron Springs, New Mexico
David was leaving his house. He was halfway across the front yard to the awning where he had left his bicycle when he stopped and turned around, sure for just a moment that someone was right behind him, watching him. For a second he thought it was his Aunt Awenita, but it couldn’t be her—she wasn’t home.
No one was there, but he couldn’t shake the feeling that someone was watching him, following him, someone dangerous and powerful.
The first thought that came to his mind wasn’t the Ancient Enemy; it was the shadowy killer he’d seen in his dreams lately. The man had killed two couples up in Colorado, and he had killed again last night—David had seen that in his dreams.
David grabbed his bicycle that he had leaned against one of the poles holding the awning up. He had locked the front door on his way out of the house, his key shoved down in his pants pocket along with his cell phone. He got on his bicycle and rode down the driveway and then onto the road, heading towards Iron Springs. It would be a long bicycle ride to Captain Begay’s house, but he needed to see him—he had no one else to turn to now. He would have gone to see Joe Blackhorn about this, but he was dead now. David had turned his back on the old man two years before that, abruptly quitting the training with him because he didn’t want to be a shaman, he wanted a normal life. He wanted to be a normal kid with friends.
“I killed it,” David had told Joe Blackhorn right after their last training session, the last one before he had walked away. “None of this ma
tters now because I killed the Ancient Enemy.”
Joe Blackhorn had given him a grave look, a look that said David understood nearly nothing about what they were doing. “You sent it back, but you can’t be sure you killed it.”
“I would know if it was still alive,” David had snapped at Joe Blackhorn. “I would be able to feel it.”
And then Joe Blackhorn had said nothing—he had just stared at David.
David walked away from his training because he just wanted to be a normal kid. He thought back then, four years ago, that it had been possible for him to be normal. But the kids in Iron Springs would never let him be normal. They all knew about his parents’ murders, about the bodies at the dig site, about Jim Whitefeather. They knew he’d been training with Joe Blackhorn, and then there were all the speculations and rumors that came with the old medicine man. Most of the kids David knew had never laid eyes on Joe Blackhorn or even knew where he lived, but it didn’t stop them from talking about him like he was some kind of bogeyman. Even the older kids stayed away, not even daring each other to venture out to where the ghost town stood—Hope’s End was the haunted house of haunted houses, even the land was haunted, a sacred site best left alone, a place that could rip a person’s soul away and leave behind a dried-out husk with an eternal mask of fear etched into their face.
David had been back to the ghost town several times, Joe Blackhorn had made him go. It had been part of the training. The first time David had been back in the ghost town, he had walked down the wide dusty street where nothing ever grew, not even a weed. As he stood in that street, he remembered riding on the back of the four-wheeler behind Cole, holding on to him. He remembered riding towards the church at the other end of town. He remembered the horrors he’d seen inside that church. He remembered the man and woman wearing the skinned faces of his parents. He remembered the spiders erupting from them, the snakes crawling around, the birds crashing in through the windows, the storm . . . the Darkwind.
Now the church was barely standing, the floorboards ripped apart, a section of the roof caved in. Joe Blackhorn wouldn’t let him enter the church for safety reasons, but he still wanted him in the ghost town, he wanted him to remember everything.
And other memories had come to David as he stood in the middle of the ghost town. He’d told Stella that he’d been in the ghost town before, and then he remembered it all. He remembered traveling to the town on horseback with the U.S. Marshal. They had been running from his home because his parents and his older brother had been slaughtered and then taken by the Ancient Enemy.
David remembered that Jed had planned on going somewhere else, to another town a few days’ ride north, but they’d had to stay in Hope’s End because of a sudden desert storm.
(The Darkwind)
David remembered staying in the saloon/hotel that a man named Moody owned. He remembered the drunken cowboy and a woman named Rose going upstairs to her room. He remembered a thin Swedish man. He remembered the bartender with the big mustache. He remembered a Navajo man they called Billy even though his real name was Nez. He remembered a gunslinger named Sanchez. And he remembered a woman named Esmerelda.
Now that David remembered those things from his past life, it all seemed so similar to when he had shown up at the dig site after his parents were murdered by the Ancient Enemy. He’d met Stella at the dig site. She had protected him from the others who wanted to kill him. She had taken him and fled to Colorado where Cole and his gang of bank robbers had carjacked them and taken them to the cabin.
David couldn’t help noticing the similarities. Jed reminded him of Cole, and Cole reminded him of Jed. Esmerelda and Stella seemed to be similar. The saloon reminded him of Tom Gordon’s cabin in Colorado. Things were eerily similar yet still different. David had been in the town of Hope’s End, in the saloon. The memory of that was as clear as any memory in his life had ever been. He had been reincarnated from that person, that David, in Hope’s End into who he was now, the same but still different. After he had fought the Ancient Enemy, he had taken it with him into its world, the netherworld, the Void. But he didn’t remember any of that. He had woken up here, in this new body, this new time. He wondered if Jed and Esmerelda had been reincarnated into Cole and Stella. The thought both thrilled him and terrified him. Was everyone a reincarnation of a past life, or were only certain people transported to the next life? Was everything a constantly turning wheel in time?
He’d asked Joe Blackhorn about these things, but of course the old man only spoke in riddles. He even told David that he didn’t have the answers to these questions; his only task was training him to become a shaman, to prepare him to fight and protect himself if the Ancient Enemy ever came back.
David had insisted that nothing like that was ever going to happen again, that the Ancient Enemy had been defeated. He had been so sure of it then, and maybe he had even been trying to convince himself as much as he had tried to convince Joe Blackhorn.
But in the end, Joe Blackhorn had been right—it was happening again.
Now he needed help, and the only person he could think of to turn to was Captain Begay.
CHAPTER 10
David
Iron Springs, New Mexico
David ended up catching a ride in the back of a pickup truck, and that saved him at least an hour of pedaling his bicycle. He got dropped off in town; he didn’t want to ask the driver of the pickup truck to take him all the way to Captain Begay’s house.
After riding down the road to Captain Begay’s house, he pushed his bike up the driveway. There were two vehicles parked in the driveway, a pickup truck and a small car. He laid his bike down out of the way and went to the front door to knock.
Mrs. Begay answered the door. For just a second she seemed to search her memory, like she was trying to recall David’s name. “David. What a surprise.”
“Hi, Mrs. Begay.”
“Call me Angie.”
“Would it be okay if I talked to the captain?” Even though Begay had been retired from the Navajo Tribal Police for a few years now, everyone still called him the captain.
Angie nodded. She stepped back and opened the door wider. “Sure. He’s in his man-cave.” She over-emphasized the word man-cave like it was some kind of secret joke between her and Captain Begay. But then her smile slipped away as she sensed the seriousness of David’s visit.
“Do you want anything to drink?” she asked after David came inside. She shut the door and then looked at him. “Some milk or water?”
“Water, please.”
Angie opened the refrigerator in the kitchen and got a bottle of water for David. She cocked her head towards a door at the other side of the kitchen. “Come on.”
David followed her to the closed door. She knocked and then opened the door a little, sticking her head in. “David Bear is here to see you.”
For just a second she stood there, blocking the doorway, the door still open just a little. It seemed like she was making sure the captain wanted to see him. Then she swung the door open all the way and gestured at David to enter.
The man-cave was at least as big as the living room. There was a bar off to one side, an old-fashioned juke box, and some bookcases filled with books along another wall near the desk and filing cabinet shoved into the corner. The walls were decorated with animal heads, framed photos, rifles, bows and arrows, artwork—an equal mixture of Navajo culture and more modern décor. Begay was in one of the two battered leather recliners situated in front of a gigantic flat screen TV mounted to the wall above the mantle of the massive fireplace.
Angie left and closed the door behind her.
Begay didn’t get up. His chair sagged a little to one side from his weight—he had gained at least another fifty pounds since retiring. He’d always been a big man, tall and stocky. He had looked like a giant to David when he’d seen him before. Now he looked so much older.
“David, what brings you by?” Begay’s face brightened with a smile.
Davi
d didn’t have an answer ready, not even sure where to begin.
“Come have a seat,” Begay said, pointing at the other recliner next to him. A large table cluttered with junk was between the two chairs. Begay’s smile slipped away and his face now had the same grave expression as his wife’s face.
As David sat down in the other recliner, Begay plucked a remote control from the clutter on the table and turned the TV off, giving David his full attention.
Begay’s diabetes had gotten worse over the last few years. Even with his socks on, David could tell that the old man’s ankles and feet were swollen. Begay moved slower and breathed heavier, but his mind was still just as sharp, his eyes showed that. To David, Begay had always been an imposing man, and even with all of the ailments, he still seemed to be a pillar of strength.
“I think something’s happening,” David said. He fiddled with the water bottle in his hands. He hadn’t even opened it up yet.
“What do you mean?” Begay asked.
David was pretty sure Begay knew exactly what he meant, but it seemed like the former captain wanted to hear the words spoken out loud. “The Darkwind,” David answered. “The Ancient Enemy.”
Begay sat perfectly still as if he’d already been bracing himself for the worst news. “And you’re sure about this?” His eyes never left David’s eyes.
“No,” David answered. “I mean I don’t have any proof. But I can feel it.”
Begay only nodded.
“I don’t know what to do,” David said. “I wish Joe Blackhorn was still alive.”
“Yes, I’m sure you do.”
David wondered if Joe Blackhorn and Begay had talked before Blackhorn died. He wondered if Blackhorn had ever told Begay how he had abandoned his training in pursuit of a “normal” life, a normal life that he now knew had never been within his reach, at least not here on the Reservation where everyone knew about his past and the horrors that had happened around him.