Wolfhowl Mountain

by Dian Cronan

  I ran as fast as I could to the room at the top of the stairs, where the Boyles died. I figured this was the best place to start because it was already weak. I covered it in gasoline, soaked everything I could. Then I lit the match. The flash was instant. Took my vision almost immediately.

  Before long, I heard the cries of the caretaker’s boy, Derry. He raced in there like a mad man, paying no attention to the flames, and yanked me out, screaming and kicking up a storm.

  Laura found my note, made a call to the O’Dwyres. While your father was saving me, your grandfather was calling the fire department. They were there much faster than I’d expected, unfortunately. Put the fire out quite efficiently, with me screaming at them the whole time. They couldn’t understand what they were doing, had no idea the impact… In saving Her, they’d made it possible for Her to kill again, to grow stronger. I knew the next family that found Her, thinking she was some diamond in the rough… They’d never stand a chance.

  Oh, how I wish it hadn’t been you, Rose.

  Chapter Fifty-One

  Adam

  We sit in contemplative silence. Enit’s lost herself in her reverie of the fire, her skin faintly glowing with sweat. I’m furiously trying to digest the facts of her story, to find some solution in them, a way to save my family. How does it all fit together?

  “What ‘bout Adam?” Beckan asks, finally breaking the silence. “You said I’d understand why Pop cheated on my muthah, but I don’t.” His face is tight. I feel bad for him, having to find out his father was unfaithful like this, no doubt stinging all the more because his mother isn’t here.

  “To understand, my dear boy,” Enit replies cryptically, “you must first think of the Greater Good.”

  “The greater good?” Letta echoes. “What does that even mean?”

  “Yes, dear,” Enit says, “the Greater Good. You see, years after my attempt to destroy Her, I realized my mistake. It wasn’t me she wanted. It isn’t some random child She seeks. She wants Her child. She wants the child who created Her, made Her come alive. I was always a substitute, like Liam is now. A substitute for the child She lost so long ago.”

  “Emily Lenore?” I ask. “Alva’s baby?”

  Enit smiles.

  “That’s ridiculous,” Letta says. “Regardless of what happened to Emily Lenore after she left that house, she’s long dead now. We can’t exactly return her to the house.”

  “Well, no, not exactly,” Enit replies.

  Beckan and Letta stare at the old woman expectantly, waiting for her to give them The Answer, but she won’t. She wants us to figure it out for ourselves. She’s gotten us this far, explained as much as she’s going to. Now we have to prove to the crazy old bat we’re paying attention.

  My mind drifts back to the afternoon at Beaver Dam Pond with Beckan and the story he’d told me, about his family, his ancestry, and how he’s related to the first Emily Lenore through the son she abandoned. The gears in my head turn, turn, turn…

  “You’re talking about a descendant,” I say, my tone accusatory. “You think you can satisfy Her with a direct descendant.” Beckan stiffens next to me.

  “Very good, Rose,” Enit’s smile is cruel. “But I’m not talking about any descendant. After all, if I were, dear Beckan might have been swallowed up by Her long before now, or Derry, or any of the O’Dwyres. No, I’m talking about something much more powerful, a much stronger bloodline, if you will.”

  And suddenly I understand how Adam fits into the fold. I understand why he’s so moody and angry. And why he hates me so much.

  “You’re crazy!” Letta says, appalled. “You’re telling us you created Adam, conceived him, just so he could what? Die? Some crazy human sacrifice – for you?”

  “Best watch your tone,” Enit says menacingly, but Letta isn’t cowed.

  “That’s the most awful thing I’ve ever heard! You’re awful.” Letta crosses her arms and looks away.

  “Wait,” Laura pleads, “please wait. I know it must sound terrible, but I –” She stops and stares at her feet, unsure what to say. When she looks up again, her tearful eyes are fixed on Beckan. “Don’t be angry with your father, Beckan. He’s a good man. And please don’t think of him as some faithless cad. You’re mother knew. As crazy as it sounds, she knew and she understood. She condoned what we did.”

  “She…she knew?” Beckan is crushed. His whole body sags into the furniture under the weight of this new information.

  Laura nods. “I’m sure you know the house began calling to your mother the moment she realized she was pregnant. She felt compelled to go up the hill, to go into the house. She did everything she could to fight it. You of all people must understand.

  “After you were born she became even more aware of the evil She spread. She wanted your mother, She wanted you. Your mother was so worried you would end up Her prisoner. It terrified her. And then the Hollisters came, and your mother became even more convinced something terrible would happen. Your mother came to mine for help.

  “We talked a long time, the three of us. We tried to find some solution, some endgame to end the suffering of all of us, of the town. And that’s when my mother suggested another child – a union of both bloodlines, that of Emily Lenore and Emily Lenore II. Surely this child would be too tempting for Her to resist. This would satisfy Her so our future children would be safe, all of the future children of Port Braseham. And for such a child to exist… Derry and I…” Laura’s voice trails off.

  “I’ve felt so guilty about it for years, you have to understand,” she continues through her tears. “But your mother, she was so wonderful, so understanding. She truly was a remarkable woman of faith. After Adam was born, she accepted him immediately. The two of you used to play when you were little. Do you remember?”

  Beckan nods silently, swallowing a lump in his throat.

  “Anyway, your mother and I decided, because of Adam’s purpose, Derry shouldn’t be involved. It would be too hard for him. It’s hard for me too.” Laura fights against her sobs. “That’s why you were never told about Adam and his relation to you. We thought that would make it all easier …” Laura completely dissolves into tears. Enit pats her shoulder. It’s oddly cold, like Enit’s telling Laura to dry it up already.

  “But it isn’t easy, is it?” Letta says disapprovingly. “You can’t send your own flesh and blood to the wolves, can you? That’s why Adam’s still here.” Enit’s lips press into a firm frown and Laura cries harder.

  “Tell me, does he even know about his purpose,” Letta demands. Another slow shake of Laura’s head. “This is ridiculous! It’s insane! You created a person, a child, to die in some supernatural blight to save yourselves? It’s heartless! It’s wrong! And it isn’t even working! For Pete’s sake, a child just died!”

  “It isn’t your fault you can’t understand,” Enit’s voice rises angrily. “You’re too young. Don’t you dare judge us! You’re lucky you’re even still alive. We all are. If She had Her way, we’d all be dead up there on that hill. All of us! And so Adam must die – my own grandchild, my own flesh and blood, yes. Adam must die so the rest of us can live.” Enit sets her jaw and throws her chin forward, as if that’s that. “It’s an unfortunate, but necessary, sacrifice.”

  “But isn’t Adam seventeen,” I ask, “like me?”

  Laura nods.

  “So time is…running out?” I say tentatively. “When’s his birthday?”

  Laura chokes back more tears. “Christmas Eve.”

  “Oh,” I reply, dazed.

  “Oh what?” Letta asks.

  “It’s just…well…Christmas Eve...is my birthday too.”

  Chapter Fifty-Two

  The Call

  I lay awake in the darkness of Enit’s living room, crumpled up on the loveseat. Laura offered me her room, but I declined. I want to be in a room that I can sneak out of – not that I have anywhere to go. But I don’t know if I can stay here, in Enit’s – Emily Lenore’s – house. Listening to the regu
lar tick, tock, tick of a grandfather clock on the far wall, I reflect on the last few days. It doesn’t feel real. I’ve been away from Wolfhowl Mountain for three days, but it feels like an eternity. And yet, the pull is still there. I can feel Her calling out, feel her smoky tendrils reaching out for me.

  Come back, Rose. Liam needs you. We need you.

  I hear Her quietly menacing voice as if I’m already there, back inside the house. The sound of Her voice slithering around in my head makes my mood more depondent than ever. But I’m not fooled. I know what’ll happen if I go back.

  I sit up, frustrated. I’m so tired, but sleep isn’t coming. And how could it? My father’s dead, my mother’s in the hospital convinced her children are dead, and Liam’s being held hostage by a fucking house… My family has been completely decimated, scattered like leaves in the wind.

  I get up and pace around the crowded room. The flannel pajama pants Laura lent me flap around my freezing ankles. I shake out my arms, feeling restless. I need to do something.

  I stray to the edges of the room, looking at the shelves teeming with dust-covered knickknacks. I touch one or two, feeling the little neglected ornaments are somehow happier for it. I blow the dust off a few of them, sneezing in the darkness. Passing by the clock, I reach out and nudge it slightly off kilter to stop the infernal ticking.

  I stand facing the hallway leading to the bedrooms. I stand there a long time, remembering it was only a few hours ago I discovered the strange news article that changed everything, set my world off its axis.

  A cool breeze pulls a few strands of hair loose from my ponytail. It’s much too cold to be the movement of air in a drafty old house. Somewhere, a window is open.

  I tiptoe down the hall, past the creepy-sad family photos. A shaft of light slides along the floor outside Adam’s room. Standing next to the doorway, I listen, hearing nothing but the loud silence of the night. I peer around the doorframe and find an empty room. The window is open, its long dark curtains flowing toward me in the breeze.

  I pick my way over to the window, avoiding several piles of dirty clothes, crumpled papers, and smelly shoes. Leaning my head out into the night, I look right – nothing – and then left – Adam.

  He’s leaning against the side of the house, his head tipped up toward the full moon. He’s wearing a dark green winter jacket that looks black as coal in the shadow of the eaves. He sighs heavily, leaking a thick cloud of cigarette smoke from his nostrils like a dragon.

  “I didn’t know you smoked.”

  “I didn’t know you spied on people.” Adam turns slowly toward me, his eyes black holes in the darkness. He flicks the cigarette into the grass and says, “I don’t smoke. Not really.”

  I eye him skeptically. He shrugs. “It’s just another piece of my character.”

  “Character?”

  “Sure,” he says. “The character Port Braseham’s created for me. Quiet loner, pouty and friendless. Gets bad grades. Listens to metal music. Smokes cigarettes…cursed.” He gives me an ironic smile.

  I shake my head. “This isn’t some bad teen movie, Adam. The only one holding you to any stereotypes around here is you.”

  Adam snorts. “That’s rich coming from you.” I feel a weak spark of anger but I don’t have the energy to argue.

  Silence.

  “I didn’t know how…” Adam begins, “special I was when I was little. Oh, I know all about the curse and Gram’s be-all-end-all solution,” he adds when I balk. “Figured that one out a while ago.”

  “What’s a while ago?” I ask cautiously, worried my arrival in town somehow ruined his life, but he doesn’t answer.

  “I grew up knowing it was a special thing to be a child in Port Braseham,” he continues. “I wasn’t sure why, of course, but I knew I was special and I knew the other children were special too. To be young in Port Braseham was so very special. And of course, none of us minded. We got everything we wanted. The children must be happy, must always be happy. And life was good for me early on. Sure, I didn’t have a dad, but everything else was just peachy.” It’s impossible to miss the sardonic tone in his voice.

  “I even had friends. Once,” he says. “Ronan. Mary. Shane. Eileen. Surprised? Don’t be. They were all nice when we were young. Isn’t everyone? It wasn’t until fourth grade things started changing. It started with Mary. She snubbed me at school. Didn’t invite me to her birthday party. The others followed suit. To his credit, Shane resisted to the very last. That was about the time my classmates figured out who I was, who I was related to. Crazy Ol’ Enit. And, unfortunately for me, that meant I was the black sheep around here.

  “At first, I thought it was because they were afraid of me, afraid of the curse, like I had some kind of magical powers. We were children, after all, and influenced by the ghost stories the older kids told us. I figured they thought I was some Carrie sequel out to get them all. And maybe that’s what it was at first. But then it began to feel like more, like hatred. That’s when the bullying started. Ronan was the ringleader, and as always, the rest of the idiots around here followed suit. No surprise to you, I’m sure.”

  “No,” I reply in a small voice. Adam doesn’t continue, the rest of his story as predictable as the bad teen movies I ridiculed earlier. Only Adam’s story doesn’t have the feel-good warm fuzzies at the end.

  “How did you know,” I ask. “How did you find out about—”

  “The truth of my conception?” he interrupts. “You think you’re the only hotshot detective around here, Rose Delaney? I’ve been around this stupid town a lot longer than you. I’ve had a lot more time to visit the library, to stand around corners listening to secret conversations. And to break into historical society records.”

  I gasp. “How did you—”

  He shrugs. “I guess I’m a better detective than you.”

  Clouds block the full moon and a gentle breeze rattles the naked tree branches nearby. The night is crisp and fresh, but I still smell the sour stink of Her in the air, like rotting flowers.

  “Come on,” Adam says.

  “Come on what?”

  “Get a jacket. I want to show you something.”

  “Where? What do you mean?”

  “Do you always ask this many questions,?” Adam’s joking manor evaporates as he stares at me. “We’re going to go answer The Call.”

  ***

  We walk slowly through the darkened, silent town. We stroll past the pastel palette of Victorian businesses, all bluish-white in the moon’s light. We’re each lost in our own thoughts of misery and what-ifs. We’re just two lost souls who sought each other out for comfort, two balloons bumping together at the ceiling. It isn’t until I realize we’ve strayed to a road walled in on each side by ancient pines that I break the silence.

  “No!” I’m surprised by the volume of my voice echoing against the fortress of trees. My feet stop, glued to the pavement, but all the while feeling a tug forward.

  Adam stops too, staring into the blackness.

  “Why did you bring me here?”

  “I didn’t bring you here,” he says. “You brought yourself here.”

  “What? That’s ridiculous, I –”

  “Think, Rose. I didn’t grab your arm and wrestle you here against your will anymore than you forced me here. We’re just walking. Did you think we were aimlessly strolling around town? A nice little early morning stroll? Think again. Think about your feet. Where did they go? They followed the path before you, the only path before you. No, Rose, I didn’t bring you here. She did. She’s calling you home, calling both of us home.”

  I desperately try to resist Adam’s words, try to block out what he’s saying so I can hold onto the last sense of any self-control I have left, but I know he’s right. I hang my head, tears stinging my eyes.

  “I don’t want to go up there, Adam,” I plead. “I don’t want to go.”

  “Me either.”

  We start walking again.

  Forward.

 
Onward.

  Home.

  Twenty minutes later, we’re puffing heavily. We stand on the crest of the hill, staring at the blood red of Her doors under the glow of the porch light. I tell myself it’s just the walk up the steep hill making my lungs burn and filling my chest with the familiar tight sensation so much like fear.

  Adam stands next to me, staring intently at the house, at the doors. Suddenly he stiffens, still as a deer in the crosshairs. A long, low crrreeeeaaaakkk fills the silence.

  Slowly, the doors begin opening, revealing the darkness beyond.

  Welcome home, my children.

  The voice is a low hiss in my ear and my body goes rigid. The pull becomes stronger, demanding I enter. I resist with every bit of strength I have left, my muscles shaking in exertion.

  Come in my darlings.

  Next to me, Adam takes a step forward, his eyes staring straight ahead, entranced. He takes another step and then another. I snatch his hand. “No, Adam!” He turns toward me with a look of surprise, as if he’d forgotten I was there. “Don’t go, Adam. Please.” I start crying, terrified of going in and of staying away. “Please. Don’t go in there.”

  Then suddenly, there’s a very different noise. Footsteps, at first light and slow, but then fast and heavy.

  “Rosie?”

  I look at the house. A small shape emerges in the darkness beyond the doors and my blood runs cold. “Liam?”

  Liam’s cherub-like face appears in the porchlight, standing on the threshold. “Rosie! Rosie, help me!”

  “Liam!” I start forward, but this time it’s Adam holding me back, his grip firm, painful.

  “It’s a trap, Rose,” he says firmly. “It’s a trap. Don’t fall for it.”

  “But it’s Liam,” I plead with him, trying to free my arm, but his grip is like steel.

  “It isn’t him,” Adam says. “That isn’t your brother. She’s tricking you!”