The Haunting of Hounds Hollow

by Jeffrey Salane

  “What are we doing?” Lucas cried. “What are you doing? The beast was going to pluck you like a guitar! And what was with that rock anyway?”

  “It’s a secret” was all Bess said.

  Lucas shook his head with frustration. “That’s it. We need to get my parents. This is way more than we can handle.”

  “Wait, guys.” Lens held his finger up to his lips. “Listen.”

  The house had fallen eerily quiet.

  Lens shook his burned hand in the cool air. “I think the dogs left.”

  Lucas put his ear to the basement door to listen. It was dead silent. “Maybe you’re right? I don’t hear anything.”

  As he pulled away, a thunderous crack split through the door like an ax, and a charred muzzle snapped inches from Lucas’s face.

  Lens leapt back and screamed, “I WAS WRONG! I WAS WRONG! THERE’S SOMETHING DOWN THERE!”

  “Upstairs!” called Lucas, and the others followed.

  Clicking claws on the hardwood floor scratched behind them as Lucas led the way down the second-floor hall.

  “Where are your parents, dude?!” screamed Lens.

  “Deep sleepers!” Lucas hollered. “We’re from the city, remember?!”

  As they rounded a corner, Bess stopped. “I think we should stay and fight.”

  “Are you crazy?” asked Lens as he pushed her forward, moving away from the danger. “How are you going to fight a ghost? The dog whistle wouldn’t even work on the beast. And he’s leading the rest of the pack.”

  “They’re not ghosts,” said Bess.

  “I don’t care,” snapped Lens. “Whatever they are, they want to make us their chew toys. And I am not a squeaker. Neither are you.”

  Lucas held up his finger and wheeled around. “I know what to do, but you might not like it.”

  A snarl echoed down the hall.

  “I’m in,” said Lens. “Let’s just get out of here now.”

  Pacing toward them, the beast’s paws singed the hundred-year-old flooring with each step. It paused and sniffed the air, lifting its head high to catch whatever curious scent it had found.

  “What’s it doing?” asked Bess.

  “Don’t know, don’t care,” said Lucas as he ran forward. “There’s another hallway on the left back here. You two take it.”

  Lens bolted, then turned back around. “Wait! What about you?”

  “I have a plan!” screamed Lucas as he hustled in the other direction and blew the dog whistle.

  The beast roared, then charged after him. The whistle had worked. Now he hoped the rest of the plan wasn’t crazy. From behind him, Lucas heard the beast howl, which sparked several other howls in response. The walls shook around him.

  They’re communicating, thought Lucas. And sure enough, from the shadows ahead of him at the end of the hall, another hound stepped out. Adrenaline pumped through his body as Lucas’s heart raced. He was surrounded.

  Lucas pulled open the closest door and jumped inside, slamming it shut behind him. The room was long and narrow—another hallway! His sneakers squeaked on the wood floor as he took off into a fast break. Lucas’s backpack rubbed against his shoulders as he heard the beast behind him. He didn’t have a real plan other than to try and get the dogs to chase him instead of Bess and Lens. They were healthy. They had lives to lead. And luckily, Lucas’s plan had worked, though now he wasn’t so sure it was the best plan.

  He kept running through doors that spiraled into different hallways. The logic of Silas’s house was absolutely dizzying. He felt the floor shift upward into an incline as he went, which at least made him comfortable that he wasn’t running in a circle back to the waiting jaws of death.

  He finally reached a door that opened into a large room. It was the size of a banquet hall and completely dark. Lucas huffed and leaned against the wall, taking a moment to catch his breath. At the other end of the room, he saw the shadow of a staircase. It was the only way out. Lucas blew the dog whistle again to make sure the hounds were still on his trail … and his trail alone. Then he pushed forward.

  Navigating the shadows, Lucas kept his gaze trained on the stairs. In the darkness, he bumped against large shapes that lumbered beside him. They looked like mannequins. Lucas shook his head. Just when he thought this house couldn’t get weirder, it found a new way to be creepy.

  Still the hounds were coming. Lucas pushed through the mannequin’s floppy arms. They dangled and swung lifelessly as he passed. He looked behind him to the entrance. It was still solid and shut, but the howling was getting closer. He needed to move faster and this room, clogged with display dummies, wasn’t helping. Lucas turned back around and smacked face-first into one of the mannequins. “Sorry,” he apologized. It was a knee-jerk reaction, and Lucas felt silly saying it to no one. Until the mannequin answered him.

  “You should not be here.” The voice was low and flat at first. Lucas looked up and the mannequin opened its eyes. No, his eyes. The plaid shirt, the hard hats, the shoes covered in sawdust and mud. These were the workers … and this must be where they went at night!

  “You should not be here,” the man said again, only louder this time. “You should not be here.”

  With every warning, more voices joined the zombie chorus. The words rattled all around Lucas, and he was happy to take the hint. A hand with an angry-looking bite mark grabbed his arm. It was cold and strong. Lucas jerked back, but the worker quietly held on. Lucas struggled, loosening the worker’s grip until he was free. Then he screamed and shoved through the waking workers, who sleepily reached for him. Lucas shrugged off their grips and finally made it up the stairs. He opened the door, casting a light over the sea of workers, all of whom were standing shoulder to shoulder. They looked at him with their dead eyes and reached out, still trying to capture him. Then Lucas slammed the door shut and ran as fast as his legs could carry him away from that awful room.

  Having zombie dogs chase him was one thing, being trapped with zombie workers was another. But the workers would have to wait; the beast was getting closer. Lucas stopped at a door when he recognized where he was. He’d definitely been lost down this hallway before. Stumbling forward, Lucas held out his arms and touched the doorknobs as he jogged. Finally, he found the knob he wanted.

  As the howling grew louder, Lucas wondered what in the world he was doing. He also wished that maybe he had just stayed in bed and put his CPAP machine back on. But at the time, it didn’t seem like Casper would have led him into a dangerous place. Hadn’t he sparred with the beast earlier? It didn’t seem like they were on the same side anymore.

  Sharp cries pierced the house, mournful and angry. They reminded Lucas of the Hounds Hollow foxhunt painting from the study. Some of the men on horseback held trumpets to call the other hunters, telling them which way the fox had escaped. Only in this hallway, he was the fox—and he was going to fight back.

  Like a light turning off, the howls ended abruptly, and the silence was even more unsettling. Now the sound of his own breath made Lucas anxious. He was beginning to doubt his plan. Because even if he didn’t know what was going to happen next, he knew what was about to walk around the corner.

  The shadow was quiet as it stepped forward, like a scene in a horror movie with the volume muted. And Lucas watched. There was no sound except his own quick breaths. Hypnotized by the creature’s alien-like skin that moved like black static down the hall, Lucas challenged the beast. “You want me? Come and get me.”

  The words had seemed brave and bold when he thought of them, but once spoken out loud, Lucas couldn’t hide his fear. His voice warbled like an unsteady tightrope walker.

  The beast didn’t care. It kept moving closer.

  Lucas clenched his fist, waiting for the right time to strike. In the darkness of the beast’s head, two red eyes began to glow where before there had been nothing. The demon awakened and moved faster now, shifting into a smooth gallop that was no louder than clouds moving through the sky.

  Lucas cou
nted the footfalls as the beast ran. One, two, three, and on four, the beast crouched and launched itself, flying with black claws outstretched. Quickly, Lucas reached for the bone-etched knob and pushed.

  The door flung open, ripping Lucas out of the house. It was the same third-floor trap he’d almost fallen from on his first day in Sweetwater Manor. The beast followed him, but it wasn’t expecting a massive drop.

  Lucas clung to the door handle and watched as the beast flew by him. It landed with a crash and released an agonized wail. Blinding pain raced up and down Lucas’s arms, but he held tight. Beneath him, the dark shadows around the beast faded as it lay motionless in the bushes. With the mysterious shroud pulled back, the beast was merely a large black dog. It nudged itself out of the bushes with its two rear legs and flipped onto its back. The beast was a Rottweiler.

  “Scout?” Lucas called, and the dog looked up at him.

  The dog’s front legs were twisted from the fall, but Scout still pushed himself along until the other hounds came. Scout’s black coat had gone gray at the edges, as had the other dogs’. As the rest of the pack approached, Lucas could see that many were limping, and their fur was matted and shaggy.

  The pack surrounded Scout and enveloped him in a warm glow. Just as Lucas had witnessed after the car accident, the dog’s legs eerily snapped back into place with a bloodcurdling crunching sound. The Rottweiler slowly turned over and stood up on all four legs, recovered. He looked up at Lucas again, who still hung from the door like a human piñata. Scout motioned with his head and Lucas knew that they would meet again, and that it would be soon. The pack charged into the deep green forest beyond the house and disappeared.

  “Lucas! Where are you?!” The calls echoed in the hallway just as the sun broke over the horizon. Bess and Lens had come looking for him.

  “Over here,” Lucas called back.

  They both leaned their heads out the doorway with Dakota and Duke by their sides.

  Lucas grimaced. His shoulder was tingling with furious pins and needles as one tiny word fell from his lips. “Help?”

  Bess held the back of Lens’s shirt as he reached out and took hold of Lucas’s hand. Then, as they pulled the door closed, Lucas found his footing and climbed inside. The three kids slumped against the wall with their eyes closed.

  A new shadow emerged in the dull light of the hallway.

  “What in the merciful world are y’all doing up here that’s making enough commotion to wake the walking dead?” Eartha Dobbs stood over them wielding a frying pan like a battle-ax. “Who are these people, Lucas? They bothering you?”

  Lucas jumped up and waved for her to stop. The ache in his shoulders flared. “No,” he said through gritted teeth. “These are my friends.”

  “I don’t remember your parents giving you permission to have friends sleep over,” said Eartha. “Especially this deep into the house. You know, Silas would have never stood for this.”

  “Yes, he would have,” snapped Bess as she stood up behind Lucas.

  “How do you suppose you know what Silas woulda wanted better than me?” asked Eartha. “He told me everything.”

  “Everything?” asked Lucas.

  “Did I stutter?” Eartha shifted the pan to her side, which Lucas assumed was the equivalent of holstering it. “Ev-ur-ee-thing. Do you think I just wandered down this hall in the middle of the night? No, sir. I had this scrappy little terrier mutt whining at my door until I followed him all the way up here.”

  Casper stepped forward and gave a happy yip before running into Lucas’s arms. “Casper, you went for help!”

  “Oh mercy, you learned their names.” Eartha clicked her tongue. “You shoulda never learned their names.”

  “Listen, Eartha,” Lucas interrupted. “We need your help. Scout’s back and so is the Hound Pound.”

  “And we think they’re after something in this house,” Bess added.

  Lens was still sitting on the ground, far away from the trapdoor. Eartha turned to him. “This true what they’re saying?”

  “Yes, ma’am.” Sliding up, he reached into his back pocket and handed her a photo he’d taken of the dogs.

  Eartha studied it for a second, then let out a heavy sigh. “I knew them curious critters were going to get into trouble sooner or later. Follow me, y’all. We’ve got a lotta talking to do before your parents wake up.”

  Back in Eartha’s cottage, Lucas sat on the couch with two ziplock packs of ice on his shoulders this time. The chill made his neck and arms hurt even more, but Eartha insisted that if he didn’t try to cool down the pain, it would only get worse. Eartha sat in her favorite chair with her arms crossed.

  “Well?” asked Bess abruptly. “You brought us here to tell us something, so tell us.”

  “Tsk, tsk, tsk.” Eartha shook her head at the young girl. “Used to be in my day, we had respect for our elders.”

  “We do, Eartha,” Lucas promised. “But we’re also scared to death right now. My parents are asleep in a house full of haunted dogs, and who knows what else, and we have no idea what’s going on.”

  “One of you does, I think.” Eartha stared at Bess, who looked around the room to avoid making eye contact. “One of you knows part of the story, but doesn’t want to share it. So I’ll go first, and then maybe you’ll feel like opening up, dear.”

  Lens flashed his eyes at Bess. “What’s she talking about?”

  “I … I have no idea.” Bess’s legs were bouncing up and down while the rest of her seemed cool and collected.

  Eartha laughed. “Okay. I should start by admitting that I don’t understand as much as I know.”

  “What do you mean?” asked Lucas.

  “Honey, I’m a housekeeper,” Eartha explained. “It’s like being a pilot. I know how to fly the plane. I can take off and land, but that doesn’t mean I know how to fix the plane if it breaks.”

  Lucas felt the cold water drip down his back and shuddered. “At least tell us about the dogs.”

  Casper, Dakota, and Duke sat at attention before Eartha. They had definitely been in her house before and were comfortable around her.

  Eartha smiled at them. “Silas loved those pups. Loved them more than anything else in this world. And they loved him. He was young when the fire struck. Heck, he barely made it out alive. Silas’s parents had to hold him down to keep him from running back inside to save his dogs. See, his parents knew that if they let Silas back in the house, they’d lose their only remaining child. There were powerful emotions at work on the night of the fire.”

  Lucas couldn’t imagine what Silas had gone through. Watching a fire tear apart his pets, his house, and everything he loved, without being able to help. It must have been awful. Lucas changed the subject. “Did Silas really lose his brother to tuberculosis?”

  Eartha nodded. “Yes, and it was horrible. Townsfolk swore there was something wrong with little Abel, something evil in his disease. Thought it had more to do with demons than doctors. When Abel passed, no one came to the funeral, except Silas and his parents. In fact, Silas told me that according to town rules, Abel couldn’t even be buried within the Sweetwater plot for fear that his sickness would spread down the family line.”

  “Come on, you’re just messing with us,” said Lens.

  “Am I?” answered Eartha. “Remember, hon, we’re not talking about the most modern times. When a disease like this struck, everyone feared it. People in town stopped talking to the Sweetwaters after Abel’s sickness. And as Abel’s health faded, Silas was left all alone to mind the dogs. He spent all his time with them. Even made a home for them in the old barn next to his room.”

  “His room?” Lucas interrupted. “So I’ve been sleeping in Silas’s room?”

  “Mmm-hmm,” said Eartha.

  Lucas closed his eyes and pictured his bedroom. The blue walls, the missing dog paintings, and the gaslit hallway to the barn. Then he opened his eyes wide. “Wait, the gaslights. The barn didn’t burn down in the fire. So if the dogs liv
ed there, they should’ve been okay, right?”

  Eartha took a deep breath, then hung her head. “This is the hard part, kids. Silas had his parents to keep him from running into the fire to save his dogs. Those dogs, though, they loved Silas every bit as hard as he loved them. And those dogs never had parents. They were strays.”

  “I don’t get it,” said Lens. “They were strays, so what?”

  Lucas felt a lump in his throat. “The dogs didn’t have parents to stop them from running into the fire to save Silas. Only, he wasn’t there and the dogs got trapped in the inferno.”

  Silence struck the room as the true history was revealed. After a moment, Lucas continued. “What happened after the fire?”

  “The Sweetwaters rebuilt their home,” said Eartha. “And Silas learned how to be alone. He avoided town as much as possible. He rarely interacted with anyone. Then, after his parents passed, he decided to keep building.”

  “No.” Lucas leaned closer. “What really happened?”

  Eartha shifted nervously in her chair. “Dogs are man’s best friends. I can’t say how, when, or much else, but those dogs … they came back to Silas. Only, when they came back, they brought something else with them. Whether it was anger, rage, or fear, I don’t know. But Silas never felt safe around them, so he built extensions on the house. Turned it into a darn maze trying to keep those dogs trapped or wandering curiously. Even after I took over caring for them, Silas would never let me be alone with the dogs. Heck, I reckon they must have nearly killed him several times.”

  “Didn’t they remember him?” asked Lucas. “Like, why would they ever hurt him?”

  Eartha shrugged as she looked at the dogs in front of her. “Honey, a scared animal will bite anything to keep itself safe. That’s why I live by Silas’s strict rules. I leave their food in the manor at night, then I run here, safe in my locked room.”

  “Why would ghost dogs eat real food?” asked Lens.

  Bess huffed. “They’re not ghosts. They’re real, like other animals, but kinda …” She searched for the right word. “Haunted.”

  Lucas slowly grabbed his backpack and pulled out the Haunted History book. He flipped through the pages until he found the term he had earmarked. “My parents gave me this book before one of my hospital visits. I don’t know why. Maybe they thought I needed to find something scarier than being sick? But after studying it the past few days, I have a theory about the Hound Pound. Have you ever heard of familiars?”