Two bodies hung in the trees. It was dark, but Evan could just make out their features. Melissa stared at him as her body twisted in the breeze, her expression appearing accusatory. But Evan knew that couldn’t be true. She was already dead. Gavin still struggled, his feet kicking furiously. His arms were tied fast behind his back.
Evan didn’t try to help his friend. Instead, he fled into the woods. He saw figures in white try to grab him, but their arms seemed to go right through him.
“The sinners will be saints,” Evan heard the leader shout at him. “You have been judged.”
Evan sprinted as if the devil himself were at his heels, flying through the forest with only his flashlight to guide him. The woods that had been so silent only minutes earlier now felt alive and angry. Evan heard the sounds of several people pursuing him. Looking behind, he saw flashes of white in the darkness.
He ran with reckless abandon, pushing through undergrowth and leaping over any obstacle he spotted with his flashlight. He fell several times but picked himself up and kept going, never noticing the scratches on his face and hands.
When he finally collapsed ten minutes later, he kept waiting for the people in white to appear around him. But the night was once again still.
After he caught his breath, Evan searched his pockets for his cell phone, only to remember he had left it back at the camp. He was exhausted and scared and no longer knew which direction to run. So he lay down on the ground, hoping his pursuers wouldn’t find him.
When morning came, Evan didn’t dare try to return to the campsite, fearing what might be waiting for him. Instead, he stumbled forward, hoping to find a road that would lead him back to civilization.
He never saw the people in white, but Evan knew they were there.
He could still hear them calling his name.
Part I
August 1812
I don’t know what devil made me go into the forest.
My father is a man of many rules, and I sometimes struggle to remember all of them. But the most important one, the one that stands above all others, is permanently etched into my soul: do not go into the woods.
He has repeated it so often and for so long that, to my mind, it has become the Eleventh Commandment.
My father goes into the forest, as do many others of his congregation. But they make long preparations before they undertake the journey and do so in the most solemn of manners. I see them march in, rows of two walking quickly after my father, dressed in white and carrying torches in their hands. They are as silent as spirits, and their faces betray nothing but iron determination. My father does not allow them to be afraid as they vanish into the sentries of pine and oak trees. He has forbade fear to come near him or those who follow in his wake.
Once, when I was younger, I stayed up to watch them return. I was past my ninth year, but even then I was burdened by an inquisitive mind. I had no proper schooling but had taught myself to read and write by memorizing passages of The Holy Book and scribbling them in the dirt. I wonder if that was what started the trouble with my father. He had promised me this knowledge, had pledged to teach me these skills. But when he saw I had learned them already on my own, he was not proud but angry. It was his gift to bestow upon me, and I had stolen it from him. That was the first time he whipped me.
The second was when I watched his congregation return in the dead of night. I sneaked from my bedroom chamber, prepared to tell any who asked that I needed to make water, but there was no need. The rest of the house was quiet. I walked from my home and past the makeshift chapel just to the edge of the forbidden woods. I looked into the impenetrable thicket and saw only darkness, with the barest hint of a path. I waited there quietly for what felt like hours, preventing myself from sleeping by propping myself in the most uncomfortable of positions.
When my father emerged, it was not with the torchlit procession that I expected. Instead, they walked just as silently as they went in, but without the torches. Where he left those, I know not. They carried nothing in their hands. They passed so close to me, I felt sure I would be noticed and remarked upon. But my father’s face never glanced in my direction, and his followers stared resolutely at his back.
I was almost disappointed. After all that fearful praying, they came out of the forest looking exactly as they went in—almost. As the last two members of my father’s flock passed, the moonlight broke unexpectedly through the trees, casting a pale light onto the procession. When it did, I could clearly see stains on their white apparel, streaks of darkish red. My father’s congregation was baptized in blood.
Despite the sudden jolt of fear that gripped me, I stayed where I was, terrified that any movement would betray my unauthorized vigil. When they had gone back to their homes, I sneaked back, moving through the house like a cat. It was all for naught. My father was waiting for me in my room.
His face was a mask of stone, but his eyes shone in the small lamplight with a fury I had never seen before. He said nothing but grabbed my arm and led me out of the house and into the stables. My impassive countenance broke when he took down the whip, but my tears and crying only seemed to enrage him further. As the whip touched my back, I vowed never again to go against my father’s wishes.
And yet tonight I found myself walking through the forest.
I am not sure what made me do it. It has been more than six years since the whipping, and I have long ago surrendered any wish to join my father’s forays. In his eyes I was not worthy to take part. I had run too far with my reading, devouring everything I could acquire. I soon knew enough to question my father’s interpretations of Holy Scripture, even as I kept his rules. But the forest holds a strange fascination for me. I often look at it at night, watching it safely from my window. I sometimes behold odd lights and dark shapes. Once I heard the distinct sound of a woman screaming.
One of the acolytes told me the forest is haunted. She said my father is trying to cleanse it of unholiness. But I fear that whatever possesses this place, it is beyond my father’s ability to redeem.
Tonight it called to me. I do not know how to say it any plainer than that. All these years of watching it, I thought I was immune to the siren song that seems to grip so many others. Yet just as dusk was falling, I stepped into its arms and vanished among the trees. I walked as if in a dream. It was unlike any place I’d seen before. Even in the fading light, the colors of the forest seemed brighter, and the wind whistling through the leaves seemed to call my name.
I walked for only a few minutes when I saw the man lurching toward me. He appeared as if from thin air, and his sudden presence startled me from my reverie. I was acutely aware that I had violated my father’s primary tenet, the first of the Eleven Commandments. The man in front of me stumbled forward and leaned against a tree. He was breathing quickly, as if he had been running, and his eyes swept over the forest. He appeared to be looking for someone.
His eyes alighted on me, and even before he spoke I could see the spark of recognition in them. I had never seen this man before and yet he looked at me as if I were a long-awaited friend.
“Edolphus,” he said.
I stood rooted to the spot as he took a step forward. Only then did I accept what I was seeing. The man’s face was blackened, but he was no slave or free Negro. His flesh was horribly charred, his clothes still smoking from the fire that must have consumed him.
“Edolphus, where is she?” the man asked.
He tramped through the woods toward me, moving with an uncertain gait. His black eyes looked at me like I was salvation.
I took a step backward.
“Where is she, Edolphus?” he said again.
I couldn’t speak words but shook my head violently from side to side. As he crossed the distance between us, I suddenly knew I could not bear for him to touch me. He held his hands out toward me, and they too were blackened and charred.
He was almost on top of me before I turned and ran. I heard him scream in dismay as I did so, the cry of some
one who has just let something very precious fall from his grasp.
“Edolphus, no!” he yelled. “How am I supposed to find her? I can’t do this without you!”
I ran through the trees, heedless of the direction in which I fled. But I could feel his dark eyes on me and I was desperate to escape. In all my years I had assumed that my father was keeping me out of the forest because of his own petty desires. I couldn’t understand why he let others in while I was kept out. In that moment the knowledge that my father had been protecting me came crashing down upon me with startling clarity.
I heard the man pursuing me, bellowing my name as the day’s light vanished and turned into night. I was desperate that he not lay his hands on me. I jumped over logs and forded through a stream that I did not remember crossing. But I couldn’t afford to pay any heed to where I was headed, sure that the man behind me was at my back.
I emerged suddenly from a thicket and into my village. I almost gasped in relief, but then I felt hands upon me, shoving me to the ground. I started to scream, and I turned over to look upon my attacker. It wasn’t my pursuer but my father.
“You were in the forest,” he said, and the horror in his voice must have matched the expression on my face.
“I’m sorry, Father,” I said, sure that now some terrible punishment awaited me. It wouldn’t be a whipping this time.
“Did you see him?” my father said urgently, his voice barely above a whisper. He spared a look behind us into the forest beyond.
It was clear of whom he was speaking.
“Yes,” I said as I fought for breath.
My father looked back at me and studied me intently.
“Did he follow you?” he asked.
“He tried, but . . .”
My voice trailed off. My father was once again looking behind us.
“You evaded him,” he said.
There was no movement from the trees in front of me. I could no longer hear the sound of the mysterious man’s voice. My father collapsed on the ground and then pulled me toward him. I was sure he was going to hit me, but instead he threw his arms around me.
“Don’t you understand the danger you could have brought with you?”
“Who was he, Father? Who was that?”
My father withdrew his hasty embrace and stared at me. I thought he was pleased to see me, but his look was so cold that I felt as if ice were spreading down my spine. He didn’t answer my question.
“He must never find us,” he said. “The Charred Man must never come to this village.”
“Why?” I asked. It was all I could manage to say.
“Because he will kill us,” my father finished. “He will kill us all.”
—Edolphus Coakley
Chapter One
Soren Chase looked into the mirror to try and find the monster sitting somewhere at the table.
He could have examined those around him directly, but he thought this method was more surreptitious and effective. The creature was more likely to give itself away if it didn’t know it was being observed.
There were six of them sitting at a large circular table, waiting for the séance to begin. To Soren, it was already obvious that the medium and everything about her was fake. All he had to do was look at the room itself, with its overwrought decor. The wallpaper was bloodred with gold crosses. One wall had the full-length mirror Soren was using to study his fellow participants, while on the opposite side of the room was a fireplace with two crisscrossed gilded swords hanging above it.
To Soren’s left there were shelves that extended from floor to ceiling, all packed with books about the paranormal. The medium, who called herself Madame Noelle, had declared it the “most extensive research library on the supernatural in the United States,” but Soren strongly suspected the books on the top shelves were just wooden blocks with dust jackets placed around them. He’d never heard of most of the titles, which pretty much guaranteed the books were fake.
The whole setup reeked of someone trying too hard. The medium had an alleged crystal ball sitting on the table before her. It had a bluish tint and mostly acted as another mirror, distorting the reflected faces of those around the table. She’d claimed it was more than 150 years old and inherited from her great-grandmother, but Soren thought it looked like the kind of “gazing ball” someone could buy from a garden store catalog.
The garish look of the room extended to Madame Noelle’s clothes. She was dressed like a Gypsy, or at least the Hollywood version of the Romany. Soren had spent enough time around the genuine article to know the closest “Noelle” had come to that persecuted tribe was an old movie. She was wearing a brightly colored headscarf and a loudly patterned dress that swirled behind her when she walked. He eyed her earrings, which were tiny painted skulls, and the rings that seemed to cling to her every finger. She kept casting anxious glances in Soren’s direction while pretending to be focused on the other participants.
Soren turned his attention from her to study the others in turn, searching for clues.
On the other side of the table was Trent Richardson, a tired-looking man focusing intently on his wife, Margaret. Trent and Margaret both looked the part of a couple in their early fifties. He had a full head of gray hair, while hers was dyed an improbable shade of red. Both gave off a vibe of desperation and worry, but Soren suspected that was due to the reason for the séance. They were here to make contact with their seventeen-year-old son, a victim of a recent car accident.
Next to Margaret on her other side was a man in horn-rimmed glasses, Tom Mahood. He had been introduced as a friend of hers from work, which might explain why he looked overdressed for the occasion. He was wearing a blazer and tie, as if this were a business meeting rather than an attempt to summon the dead. He drummed his fingers repeatedly on the table, occasionally stopping to crack his knuckles.
To Mahood’s right sat a vivacious blond, who seemed distinctly out of place. She was in her early twenties and looked vaguely familiar to Soren. He couldn’t tell, however, if he had really seen her before or if it was just her type. She was dressed in a short skirt and stylish red shoes, with a top that accentuated, but didn’t inappropriately flaunt, her bosom. She exhibited a cheerful and excited countenance that was at odds with the somber surroundings. Like the medium, she had also been demonstrating an unusual interest in Soren, flashing him several warm smiles despite the fact that he sat morosely at the table without engaging anyone.
Soren watched them talking to each other in the mirror and knew that one of them was a killer—it was just a question of who.
He supposed it was possible his informant was wrong. Perhaps someone just wanted to cause trouble for Madame Noelle or one of her guests. But the information was so specific that only someone already entrenched in the world of the paranormal would have known what to say. That narrowed the number of candidates for a hoax like this considerably.
More likely it was a trap, an attempt by the monster itself to lure Soren here. If so, it wouldn’t be the first time—and he would be damned if he stayed away. He remembered something his old friend John used to say: “Fortune favors the bold.” Soren had never embraced an adage quite as enthusiastically as that one.
He studied the people at the table, but nothing about their behavior set any of them apart. Had he really thought there would be some distinguishing trait? These creatures had survived for millennia because of their knack for verisimilitude.
“It’s time for us to begin,” Madame Noelle said in an accented voice.
The only problem was her accent seemed to change from sounding Russian to British and, in a moment of likely candor, Southern American.
Soren wrenched his eyes away from the full-length mirror and back to the actual table. He saw Noelle watching him mistrustfully. Ostensibly he was there as the official skeptic at the séance. He had approached Trent and convinced him he needed one to ensure the medium wasn’t taking advantage of the grieving couple.
Had he wanted to, Soren c
ould have proved Madame Noelle a fake in about thirty seconds. All he had to do was stroll to the bookcase on the far wall and find the trapdoor that lay hidden there. The door probably opened to a small closet with all sorts of paraphernalia that Noelle would use during the séance. It also undoubtedly had a secret passage to another part of the house so that Noelle’s partner could come and go without being detected. If those attending got a look inside, the game would be up. Soren would have loved to see Noelle explain it, but he had a more important task.
Soren could also see how nervous the medium was and knew from his research that this was her first stab at an actual séance. He had dug up her real name—Lou Ann Spengler. She was a former receptionist for Loudoun County’s last prominent psychic, Madame Zora. Soren’s presence clearly made her anxious, as if she knew he could see right through her. He couldn’t tell her that he didn’t give a damn about her or what she was up to. He was hunting a much more dangerous prey.
The medium looked away from Soren and back to her other assembled guests.
“We are here to undertake a perilous journey,” she said. “The six of us together will breach the walls of this reality and reach across the mortal world into the spiritual realm. We will endeavor to contact Tad Richardson, the son of two of our guests tonight. But I must issue a warning first. The supernatural world is not to be traveled lightly, and finding one lost soul amid the millions is a difficult task. I, Madame Noelle, have studied for more than a decade, learning at the foot of the late and lamented Madame Zora, whose talent and abilities were unparalleled. I can bring Tad to us, but I must have absolute cooperation.”
Soren rolled his eyes at the speech, knowing the other guests couldn’t see his reaction. He pushed his sunglasses, which had drifted ever so slightly down the bridge of his nose, farther up onto his face. He liked being able to see into the eyes of others while they saw only their reflection when they looked back at him.
The Forest of Forever (The Soren Chase Series, Book One) Page 2