by Sam Zadgan
“What is all this, Shaz?” Edward broke the long silence.
“Don’t worry, Eddy…you go do the living room and I’ll finish in here. If you see a badly made ashtray, with the word ‘Mum’ on it, put it in the box to take home with us,” Shannon replied as she circled around to the table.
“Sure.” Edward left the room and headed down the hall.
Shannon sat behind the table, with five sets of papers laid out. In the middle she found an old journal, which did not seem to be her father’s. This journal was too old, and the handwriting too nice to be his. The paper had a dark patina and the ink in parts had faded. It had been written with ink, most likely fountain pen, but a dipping fountain pen, as every now and again the line seemed to start with heavy flowing ink and it tapered away as the ink had run out.
The journal seemed to be that of a barber, as it chronicled the day’s work and idle gossip that the barber would hear on the day. But going back to the page that was open when she found it, a few pages from the end, she noticed that the writing had become erratic and somewhat clumsy. However, this seemed to be the most interesting part of the book and the part that gave some clues as to her father’s work.
On the last entry, the journal read like a cry for help of some kind. But the message was queer and fictional. She continued reading regardless.
“I’m stuck here now. I have days where I am alive and others when I’m not. I try to reach out, but I’m not here. I don’t know where I am.
“I need help.
“I am calling out to my kin, my child, the child of my child and even beyond. I don’t know how long I’ve been here. I don’t know if I am dead or alive.
“Today I am myself, but I don’t know when the last time was when I was myself. I lose track of time here, I don’t even know what year this is anymore.
“I am under a spell that I can’t break. All I remember is walking west, but it was past the witching hour and the caravan took us on enough turns to lose our bearings. Too many events took place for me to remember exactly where we went.
“I hope this place exists, and whoever finds this book can find me and set me free.”
Shannon put the book down, and sat back to think of what this meant and why it became the work of her father to find this man.
From there she progressed to her father’s other books and notebooks specifically. Reading what he had learnt from the books and the experiments he carried out to prove the truth; a truth that only he knew of, a dangerous reality that threatened existence and morality.
She learnt that her father and his father before him had taken this path of discovery and this was something of a family heritage. But both had failed; yet they had small victories. Her grandfather found the old notebook, and her father had discovered a book of sorcery that was connected to this myth.
It soon dawned on her that she was next; her father had left all of his research within easy access and order for her to find it. He meant for her to continue it. He had sacrificed fatherhood for a greater mission, and Shannon, although she struggled with the idea, began to understand it. She was next and she would have to carry out what they could not.
Five years ago, this awakening was the single most important event in her life. She drew meaning in life, with a purpose far beyond the daily drudgery of the commercial world and insignificance of material belongings and careers. She focused her attention on one purpose. She was the one that would destroy Larwock and those fiends that occupied it.
Birth of a town
~
1. The strange case of Mr Green
It must have been over a hundred years ago now, when a commune packed their caravans, fed their horses and went on their long journey across the dark forest to set up their new home. The reasons behind the journey weren’t so innocent, however; they were escaping a harrowing fate. But the persecution wasn’t uncalled for; in fact it was a necessity and an act of self-defence. This commune of misfits was a cult led by a man who partook in the darkest of magic whilst under influence of drugs of every nature.
Mr Green was the name he was known by, a man of mysterious power with an unknown past to most people, but feared and revered all at the same time. His past, however, was less spectacular than most believe, apart from one particular incident that made him the man he became.
He was born to farmers; as an only child, he was pampered more than he should have been. At the age of twelve he developed a strange illness, which robbed him the use of his legs, and he was reduced to sitting, or struggling on homemade crutches. The kind of medical assistance he required was not afforded to him.
In his solitary despair, Mr Green took an unhealthy dislike towards the human race and the world as it was.
His hatred led him to researching the dark arts, and given the amount of free time he had, his knowledge grew fast and deep. This growing solitude was of concern to his ageing and overtired parents. Most other farmers in the area would pass the hard work to their children once they were of age and thus wouldn’t slave on the land in their elder years. However, the Greens didn’t have that luxury, and the daily grind along with the grief and worry finally took their toll on the couple. Firstly his father died at the age of 42, and only four years later his mother passed at the age of 41.
Mr Green was left to his own devices by the age of 19, head full of the darkest knowledge and a body still confined to a chair. What happened next for the young man was the defining moment, however; a peculiar event that determined not only his fate but all those who joined him and his commune.
On a night where the locals were sure they had heard farm animals on the Green farm screaming and desperately trying to escape, there was a thunderstorm. One eye witness who passed the story on was a young boy in a neighbouring farm, who sat at his bedroom window watching the storm. He was amazed by the sight as he had been from a young age. Unlike other young children who would run to their mother’s side, this young boy found the experience enthralling. It’s because of his gaze that we know what happened next to Mr Green.
The sequence of events that the boy explained to his father was dismissed at first, but on subsequent days when his father witnessed the results for himself, he became a believer and began to spread the story through the town. The story was embellished and whispers altered, but the general theme was all the same. Subsequently the fantastical nature of the events was conserved within everyone’s retelling of that strange night.
The boy was taking great care in watching and listening to the thunderstorm. He would listen for the sound of thunder and begin to count sets of three second intervals to determine the distance of the lightning from his location. Even though the sound made him jump, he enjoyed the sensation, and kept a keen eye on the clouds. But one thing made his focus falter, when he saw Mr Green struggling out of his house to the paddock on his poorly made crutches. The mud and wind made this a very difficult trip, but through sheer grit and determination he managed to pull himself a good ten feet away from his house.
Once there, the boy swears that the thunder subsided and clouds began to move quicker and not in one linear direction, but in one direction towards each other, clustering above the Green farm. Then he heard Mr Green scream out some form of chant, repeating it over and over, with his voice becoming louder with each repetition. Moving his focus to the clouds, the boy noticed the wind swirling and picking up light debris, spinning it around Mr Green. Meanwhile he started hearing the slow and low rumbling of thunder as if it was building up to something hazardous.
After a few moments, the storm seemed to be at full strength and in an instant a lightning rod shot down from the centre of the clouds along with a deafening sound that made the boy jump back and his ears hum. His eyes, however, were unaffected and he witnessed the event. The lightning had found Mr Green and was upon him like a beacon, illuminating his whole body as he shook under the great power of the lightning.
The boy said it went on for minutes, but most likely only a
few seconds; even still, any man would have surely perished from this intense charge. The boy then told his father that, when the lightning dissipated to the ground, Mr Green was still standing, and very much alive. He did go down to his knees for a short moment, but then he stood up, victorious.
The boy remembered that Mr Green then raised his hands in the air, thanking the storm, as the clouds and thunder subsided and was replaced with clear night skies. Mr Green then picked up his crutches and threw them as far as he could muster. Rejuvenated, he strode with pride into his house, and all was quiet in the sky and on the Green farm.
2. The seeds of evil
Much had happened in the twelve years since Mr Green miraculously restored his legs, and for the most part what had happened was seen to be evil and blasphemous. It began with the weekly gatherings on the Green farm. At first it started with one or two people, but before long it grew to approximately fifty, over the years.
Then there was the farm itself. Mr Green did not grow any crops and his animals had either died through starvation or escaped, but he did somehow foster the growth of a special breed of mushrooms throughout his property. These mushrooms were harvested at the start of each weekly meeting, consumed at the events, and by the following week had regrown completely.
The locals put this down to devil worship and witchcraft, but harmless to those outside the circle. They knew that the meetings were purely drug-fuelled orgies and that was the extent of it all—and to their credit they were mostly correct. What they didn’t know was what these orgies were in aid of and what the result would be.
The local church’s weekly sermons always included some reference to the Green farm and what took place, urging the congregation to stay clear of the farm and the people involved. Even the Reverend steered clear of the farm or contact with the people involved.
The town became divided into two parts, with even the local businesses biased towards either side. Mr Green’s people shopped at their own stores and drank in their own pub, whilst the other shops and the other pub in town were the domain of the rest of the town folk. There was an uneasy tension between the two groups, which in the most part was peaceful, with currents of mistrust and some fear running beneath the surface. But it all changed when a special young woman came into town, from parts unknown.
There were fantastic rumors that she was not of this earth; that she had come from the sea and was summoned by Mr Green. Strangers did not frequent this part of the world very often, especially ones who wandered into the town unannounced, wearing only a white cotton robe and carrying no baggage. She was alone, without a name and without a place to live, but somehow she walked through the town quietly and with purpose, making no mistake in direction as she arrived at the front door of the Green farmhouse. Some folk even followed her to see what would happen next, but their fear didn’t allow them to get too close to know exactly what happened, except to say that she was welcomed into the house like a long-lost relative.
The men were more taken by the arrival than their wives, mostly drawn to her natural beauty and the glow of her perfect white skin. The day she arrived was like a dream; she glided through the street, her white robe floating in the trailing wind. Her straight red hair blew gently in the breeze, dancing in the air like fairies. Her posture was perfect and she looked ahead, never breaking stride as her bare feet walked over the dirt road that ran through the middle of town. Even though her glide was silent, the men were drawn to the store windows as if witnessing a storm rushing through the centre of town. They gawked, memorised by her beauty, but she did not notice any of the attention afforded to her by the men, and she carried on.
The Green farm was never the same after the red-haired woman arrived; it was already strange, but now it was beyond the boundaries of tolerance. The fungi that created the mushrooms on a weekly basis released a stench now, which travelled throughout the town and into other houses. Every Thursday morning as if on cue, the town would be overtaken by the stench of the mushrooms, and it continued till Friday night when they were harvested. The meetings now became louder and harrowing screams could be heard from the house. It wasn’t long before the followers never left the Green farm and the nightly rituals ensued relentlessly.
The town folk knew they would have to take action. But their underlying fear relegated the actions to thoughts and quiet discussions rather than any real response to the danger. This was all until the night of May 31, 1905, the night their fears created enough courage, born out of self-preservation and survival, that they banded together against the misfits that had plagued their town for too long.
3. Disaster at Mount Kembla
Months before the end of May in 1905, the red-haired woman arrived, unannounced and unknown to all in the town. No one ventured to seek her out or learn her name or past, just rumours and strange tales of the imagination followed her into the town and in the minds of the town folk. But one thing known for sure was that she knew she was there for a reason and in the whole time leading to the event in May she was never seen leaving the Green farm. Which made it even stranger in the people’s minds, as some speculated that she was sent by a dark lord and was sacrificed during one the weekly debaucheries that went on at the Green farm.
Among the many stories that circled the town, each one trying to outdo the other, there was a familiar thread that could be laced together. No one was sure where any of the stories originated from; some say they saw certain things and some were just misunderstood whispers, but there were some common threads. The wiser of the town folk, those less likely to succumb to idle gossip and slandering, actually took some time to hear the stories and try to research the basis for each one and come to a conclusion as to the truths and exaggerations. One man who did such a task, Steve Cooling, ran the local barber shop and was privy to hearing every rumour and story in town.
After hearing all the stories he decided he would go to some of the places mentioned in the stories and see if these stories had any basis in truth, and in some cases he was surprised that the weirdest tales actually carried more weight than others. Slowly, he created a log of each tale and put together his thoughts on each one. By the end, he had a story of the red-haired woman, and he told this story to a few, who told it on and before long this became the tale of Charlene Everette.
Charlene was not a strange creature or a product of any conjuration, but a bastard child of a mining family from Mount Kembla, a town just outside Wollongong. Her father was one of the miners, and her mother was the daughter of the local inn keeper. This particular inn keeper was a ruthless and cold man who disowned his daughter once she was pregnant and threw her to the streets. With nowhere to turn, the daughter left, and found solace in an abandoned cabin on the outskirts of town.
She was never visited by family, as her father had forbidden it, and she never entered town for fear of retribution. Although it was no secret she was living in the cabin, it was a mystery, however, how she managed to give birth and raise her child by herself, with no medical aid or otherwise.
Her daughter Charlene grew to the age of fifteen in that cabin without once entering the town. They lived off what the forest provided and from time to time they would hunt small rodents and possums to supplement an otherwise vegetarian diet. However, in 1902, at the age of fifteen, Charlene was forced to leave their solace of peace and isolation and enter the town. Her mother had been sick for some time and she had no choice but to seek the aid of modern medicine. On July 29th she left their cabin and ventured into town hoping to come back and mend her mother, the only person she had known in this world.
On foot, she travelled through the forest for over a day and arrived tired and hungry on July 30th. Charlene was completely overwhelmed by the city of Mount Kembla. She had lived with one person her whole life, and in a city with hundreds of people rushing from one place to another was a sight she had never witnessed before. Her mother, however, had taught her to read, so she scanned the stores and street signs as she walked through th
e town, but didn’t notice the populous scanning her. She was unaware of the thoughts that were going through their minds as they looked upon her unblemished young white skin, loosely covered by a white robe, contrasting against her long red hair. To say she was out of place with the coal-stained workers and hard skinned women of this town would be a grave understatement.
She endured until she stumbled upon the local pharmacy. Inside she met and was comforted by the pharmacist, who was also one of the town doctors. He assured her that it was not a serious illness, given the symptoms, and that he would mix the medicine the next day and he would accompany her to their cabin to consult her mother. Her polite nature and genuine gratitude for his assistance was enough reason for him to agree to make this trip without charge, and so she decided to stay the night at the inn.
Charlene checked into the inn in the afternoon, and had her dinner whilst the miners were drowning another day of sweat-filled work with cold beers. The more they drank the more their interest in the young red-haired woman grew, and the more their voices travelled to her ears. She rushed her dinner and made her way up the stairs to her room, catching an evil glance from one of the miners on the way.
Once in her room she barricaded the door with a dressing table and a chair, and she sat on her bed listening to the voices of the miners below echoing up the stairwell and into her room. Their drunken lust was turning them into animals as they bellowed scenarios where they would have their way with the young girl. But this was not all talk, for after what seemed like twenty minutes there was a knock on her door, followed by a gentle turn of the door knob. She did not dare answer the door, she knew who was there and she could hear the shuffling feet of drunken men outside her room.
Finally there was one, then two big shoulder thrusts to the door, the first one blasting the door ajar, and the second one pushing the furniture to the side and opening the door wide and free of obstructions. Charlene screamed, but there was no help in sight, as five miners stood at her door, grinning with all the dastardly intentions in their minds. What happened next needs no explanation, only to mention that this was a mistake that those miners and the town would never forget.