The Curious Case of Jacob's Hallow

by Patrick Walsh

  “So where is it...the code or whatever?” Luke stood up, ready to go.

  Aza read out loud from the paper. “You will find what you seek where the twin sirens weep.”

  Gretel gave her mom what she wanted and looked over to him. “Well what does that mean Aza?”

  He ripped the parchment to shreds and looked up to them.“My name isn’t Aza. It’s Azriel.”

  Chapter 17: Who I Was

  Iwas sitting in the study. Perhaps I was playing with some of my stuffed animals or scribbling rubbish on a leftover piece of paper. There were countless papers. Dad had pinned so many of them against the walls, woven them with threads in an attempt to connect each one in some meaningful way. I didn’t think anything of them back then, just part of a business I was too young to care about. Now that I think about it, I might have been eating cake as well. My tenth birthday was a day or so before. Doesn’t matter I suppose, just more of a reason I was so oblivious of everything around me. Arthur was there, like he had been most nights. He and dad were arguing about something. He might have recently come back from the necropolis now that I think about it. Back then I just figured it was over nothing important, like usual, but now I’m certain it was over the piece of paper with the code. Arhtur had hidden something, and Dad was furious. The undertaker and Barnabee were thrown around and, in the end, they just agreed to disagree. Arthur left, writing something in one of his million notebooks. He always did that. All in all, it looked like business as usual.

  It was a drawing, now that I think about it, not playing. I remember because it was late and when I was done, I showed it to him. He humored me and I got ready for bed. Again, all was going as it normally did, but something was different. Dad was worried, and just kept getting more and more so. I know he was smiling a lot, keeping calm, but I could tell something was wrong. Whatever it was didn’t matter, he could handle it. He could handle anything. That’s what I thought when he tucked me into bed and went back downstairs. The winds were strong that night. I was afraid they might even break the shutters. If those gave way then any number of things could get in. Of course, when your young, that fear just rolls around in your head getting bigger and bigger. I was snuggling that cat Gretel found….but it wasn’t enough to calm me. Ultimately, it was impossible to sleep and I went back downstairs to find dad. He was talking on his transponder to someone. He was rubbing his head. He was worried and afraid of someone or something. I waited for him to finish and figured out he was talking to grandpa, Gregory Tessior.

  When he was done, I walked over and asked to sleep in his bed. He jumped when he saw me, and I got very afraid. I sat on his lap and told him about the storm. He probably wasn’t listening because suddenly he asked if I wanted to have a camp out. Now the plot of land his mill sat upon was small, so he built up. Mom’s idea, I think. In the end, he had used the leviathan as support to build it pretty high up. Since it was cheaper to add new levels rather than buy more land, we lived there too. Like any kid, I liked things that were high up. Once in a while, I would ask to have a camp out on the top floor where we stored barrels and other things. Actually ...knowing what was in the barrels that night, taking me up there was probably not the best idea, but I doubt he was thinking straight. He got some blankets and laid me down. I think he said he’d come up when he was done with some business. I laid there for a while, feeling safe and exited. Whenever we camped out, he would bring up these slimy mushrooms covered in sugar, again, not the best choice but it made me happy...and that’s all he really cared about. I waited for as long as I could before starting to doze off… but then the ground shook. It was soft at first, but persisted, getting louder and louder the closer something drew.

  I began to feel afraid again. I waited for dad to come back with the food, not terrified like me, and tell all about what the shaking really was. Not some monster in the night, but something only the adults knew about. When he did come back, he was sweating. His eyes...there was some monster coming for us. I began to panic, but he consoled me just as fast. Despite how brave of a face he put on, I could tell he was afraid. His body could lie, but his soul couldn’t...but I wanted to believe otherwise...so I did. He looked in one of the barrels and counted them, then pulled me down the stairs. I kept asking him what was going on, but he just told me to pack a bag with some clothes and all my favorite toys. It didn’t take long. Before I knew it, I was back out in the hallway and seeing dad pouring something around the floor. Not from the barrels he had looked at, but from some boxes downstairs. It was runny, not as much as water. When I asked what it was, he just told me not to worry because I would be going on a little trip. It was night so I was confused but didn’t want to ask. Then came the pounding at the door, windows, and walls. Whatever was shaking the ground was just outside…. along with countless wights.

  Dad grabbed my hand and pulled me to the living room. I stood by as he ripped aside the bookshelf to reveal a tunnel. It was dark, but I could see well enough. I could always see better in the dark then most, and dad knew it. I was crying now; fear was likely boiling off. I just wanted to know what was going on. The look in his eyes...he was in pain. He knelt down beside me and gave me a big hug. It was tighter than any he had ever given...as if he knew he would never have the chance again. While the front door began to split, he looked me right in the eyes. He said that he loved me, and that he didn’t say it enough. I didn’t know what to think. When the first of the arms broke through, he told me to run. I was to run straight to Gregory’s and stop for nothing, not even to look back. He made me promise, kept asking if I trusted him. I stumbled into the tunnel and he said he would meet me there. The face he gave...despite knowing this was the end, he looked as confident as ever…. as if he believed every word he said.

  The bookshelf closed and I ran through the darkness, eventually emerging into the fields. They were shorter back then and I could see over them. While trees and the leviathan blocked out most of my view, I could see something massive next to the mill. It was a ship, but there was something inside of it…. some giant thing. Then I remembered my father's orders. I would not look back. I made it out to the lower roads. Gregory lived a lot further into the country back then. There wasn’t any fog...at least not much ...or wights. It as if all the evil was focused on that one building...on dad. Even still, there was enough mist to nearly get me lost, or maybe it was just my own fear. It was Gregory that found me. He was dressed in his old Nightwatch uniform, a sword at his side and rifle at his back. The coat and hat were a dark, powerful grey...it was striking. He almost missed me, but I think he saw my hair. It didn’t matter much. There was an explosion at the top floor of the mill that lit a flame traveling down the rest of the building.

  I didn’t turn back, but I knew. My mind fell back to the stories he and grandad would read... when the hero made their last stand. All the signs had been there. I fell...and screamed. Even then I knew, I could feel the terror and anguish just firing out like a thousand little snakes. I saw Gregory. He told me later that, in that moment, he wanted nothing more than to run away, to leave me there. In all the times he felt the fear of the wights...this was...so much worse. I’d guess because what fueled the fear was so close to his own heart. But despite it all, he hugged me close and told me everything was going to be ok. I bawled and cried for...too long, but he stood by my side…. found enough strength to lift me up and take me back to his home. He was up all night, waiting, watching by the windows for them to follow us here. Yet they never did. We were both up until dawn, he doing everything he could to comfort me. I was devastated...I think I kept asking if he was ok, when dad was gonna meet us. Gregory just humored me, saying it all would be fine until I just fell asleep. That morning I woke up to see him at the door. He was slumped over and... well a heavy sleeper. I remember thinking he might be dead too...the look on his face when I began shaking him was priceless.

  For a while after, I hid out in one of the two rooms in his cottage. News of the fire at the mill spread, with each gro
up having their own ideas on what started it. Some threw around Arthur, others Tobias, and even some thought dad did it in a drunken rage. Yet one thing was certain; Thomas and Riel Verenhaus were dead. It was in the papers, and the talk of the town for the next few weeks until some other grim tragedy stole the spotlight. My name is Azriel, but dad only ever called me Riel when he shortened it. The name is apparently an angel of some kind and the “riel” or “rael” runs through most of their names. I think he called me that rather than Aza because...well it reminded him of mom. Whatever the reason, people thought I was dead, and Gregory wanted to keep it that way. He knew that the things here don’t stop at just you, they would go after anyone else. He was even prepared for an attack on his own house, but...well to most of the town, he and my dad didn’t like one another. They didn’t go after him, but he figured they would if they knew I was around.

  I’m not sure where things would have gone from there. Maybe it would have been him that restarted the Nightwatch or...well doesn’t matter much at this point. A few months passed and things were getting along ok. I was studying language and laying low while he was off working and whatever else. I really got into those books. I’ve been told I speak….well I guess it would be Vorustrow….pretty well. Gregory had so many of them and there was so much time...even after things settled down. Then after a while, leaning it felt calming. Though now I’m getting off track. Eventually he began making preparations to sell his plot of land to one of the farmers and buy a small place in town. The problem was how to get me there….and how to raise me in general. We both knew I couldn’t spend my whole life cooped up in the shadows, but my presence wouldn’t go unnoticed if I didn’t. That’s when a tragedy struck an old friend of his. His name was Edger, a bum from Cedrics Row. Yet, he was someone held in high esteem down there, and actually had a job he was making money from. While he didn’t have the family or connections to get land, after a lifetime of struggling, the man had damn near everything else. He had coins in the bank, a loving wife, plenty of friends….and a son...a year or two older than me.

  From what I gathered, there was a large area in Cedric’s Row that they could use only during the day. There was a big hole in it that led deeper underground and wights would crawl out of it. Probably linked up with the older part of the necropolis at some point down the line, given what I know now. It had been patched time after time, but it would always breakdown during the nights. One time, when he was away...the wights managed to break it down during the day. It was unprecedented ...it was a massacre. They lived nearby and... his wife and son were killed. This broke him. I remember him coming by more and more often just...ruined. On a few of his last visits he just looked at me, sometimes even while Gregory was talking. I didn’t know why, but found out later on the last day he visited. His face was calm, and his soul at peace. They talked, argued, Gregory shouted and nearly broke down, but...but couldn’t stop his old friend. They just shook hands and saw each other off.

  I found out later that he felt that he was too old to start over and... didn’t really want to. When they died he just gave up. His son and wife hadn’t actually been confirmed dead….not officially anyways. People down there had their own little cliques and when the attack happened there was nothing but chaos. When he heard about me, he came up with an idea. His son had been infected with a rare fungus at a young age, a sister to what Gregory has if I recall. It could be cured, but only buy cutting it out. This worked but...well he kept his face wrapped or just...hidden after that. I don’t know what all they did. But as far as the rest of the town was concerned, I was Edger’s son staying with a friend of the family. What money he didn’t donate to other friends he spent on gunpowder. According to some people who tried to chase him down, he rigged something up and went back to the hole in the wall. His legend states that he fought his way to the very end of the tunnel and blew himself up next to some cracked support pillar. It collapsed and sealed off the lower levels once and for all, earning him the title Hero of the Olmire”.

  From there, grandad cut my hair and had me wrap my face so I could pretend to be the boy. He later adopted me and renamed me to Aza so at least part of my real name would stick. It’s a funny custom, renaming your adopted kids. Like everything else around here there’s probably some evil or tragic reason for it. Either way, we carried on. He raised me, I met you two, and well...here we are.

  Aza, Luke, and Aggie were standing at the toppled gate of the old cemetery. There used to be more buildings on the way to it, but the sinister forest had long since overtaken them. The ground here was grimy and waterlogged, with heavy moss hanging from the twisting trees. Large, porous toadstools and other murky mildews sat twisting between the broken graves and fallen headstones. There were three large mausoleums at the far end that lay crumbling away, one even had its vault door torn clean off. The other two were half sunken, much like the thorny fence that surrounded this eerie place. It was already night, yet the fog hadn’t rolled in. It sat slithering around the southern edge but had yet to engulf the entire village as it should have. The trip here had gone all but unabated, not even the beasts of the woods paying them mind.

  “This aint nuthin but a setup.” Aggie swung the shovel over her shoulder and put her transponder into a pot of water she kept crudely nestled in her bag. The whole way there she had been making calls from one contact to the next.

  “Yeah. I’m hoping we can brute force our way through it.” Aza strode under the broken threshold, a shovel of his own in hand.

  “So, whys keep it a secret from peoples like me an Aggie?” Luke turned to him, feeling so much worse for his oldest friend.

  “The less that knew the better. Besides, I prefer to look for trouble then to have trouble looking for me...or my family.” He looked at both of them when he said it.

  Aggie nodded. “Eye. So, what exactly are we lookin fer?”

  Aza stumbled as his boot sank into the mud, something slithering against it. “The journal said they buried it where the twin sirens weep. My dad and Arthur had a little joke about angels. In mom’s books there were a few drawings of them and he thought they looked like sirens. So, what we’re looking for is two crying angels. There’s only one place in town your even gonna find them.” He impaled his shovel through the boggy earth and looked solemnly ahead. There was but one tombstone, chipped and scummy, yet newer than any other. Carved into it were two simple figures with wings and weeping eyes. Between them were a set of dates and a single name “Eleene Tessior Verehaus”. Aza just stood where he was, knowing what had to lie below. Yet standing here, now, in the dark of night...the idea of what he had to do next just sickened him. Luke and Aggie stood back, knowing who the grave belonged to.

  “Well lads, if we’re doin this, then we’re doin this.”

  Aggie stepped forwards and wedged her shovel into the wet earth. Her strength had long since left her, but her vigor was stronger than ever. Luke started digging next, the two having made little headway before Aza finally joined in. As he began, Aggie stopped and sat down, already tired out. Still, she kept the lantern steady and looked out into the night, searching for who or what might be hiding just out of view. The many sounds echoing from the woods drown out anything her old ears may have picked up, but her eyes were as keen as her wits. Like Aza, she could see well in the dark, and kept finding herself drawn to the center mausoleum. While she couldn’t see it, she could tell there was something waiting inside. She nodded to the other two, who each looked up to it. Luke couldn’t see a thing, but Aza saw the faint glimmer of metal catching the slivers of the lantern light. They would deal with it when they dealt with it.

  The pile of dirt by their side grew as the two boys drew deeper into the earth. Their digging, once in a while, struck the bodies of large worms that swam around in the muck. Each time they would screech and slither back into the depths as the shovels continued their search. The soil itself would sink and begin to bend around them, filling what they had dug. Yet not as much as it should have.
There were not just worms, but mycelium binding the swampy ground together. Aza noticed some of them looked more like the tendrils of an animal, maybe the edges of some unseen horror far into the darkness. It was a grim thought but helped take his mind off the morbid task at hand. Eventually, it was Luke who struck the coffin first, his shovel cracking through the saturated wood. Their digging, and the nature of the soil, had caused a deep slope to form across from the pile of excavated dirt. At his friend's stern instance, Aza used it to climb up and out of the grave. He turned around while Luke pulled his shirt over his nose and cracked open the old casket, lantern now in his hand.

  The rotten wood broke away and he was left staring down at the skeletal body once hidden within. She wore a black dress with a thick veil covering her face, her maggot ridden arms crossed peacefully over her chest. Across them was a glass bottle with a rolled up parchment inside. For a moment, Luke was stunned by the sight. He had seen the dead, the wights, the monsters, slaughtered animals on the farm...but not this. There was something unsettling about how simple it was..this...reminder of where we will all end up one day. He slowly reached down and pulled the bottle from her rigid arms, held in place by iron rods. The rotten lid fell back over, and he crawled out of the pit. Both he and Aza struck the edges of their hole and let the pile fall back in, mostly covering it once again. The grieving son wanted nothing more than to finish reburying it as an act of respect, but there was simply no time.

  “So... I guess we gotta get this outta here?” Luke handed it off to Aza.

  “Eye. We’ll need ta head back another route. A friend has horses waitin.”

  “Are you gonna try and clear the forest?” Luke was surprised but wouldn’t put it past the old woman.

  “Nah, don’t be daft. I have a way to take it far, far from this rotten place. I’ll be needin you two teh come with me, if ya wanna see this through.” Her last words were solemn, carrying with them a sense of the end.