by JL Bryan
Shiloh shrugged and opened her mouth.
“Nobody. She didn't tell us she was hiding,” Ephraim said. “You're going to be in so much trouble, Shy.”
The girl frowned, her expression reminding me of her mother talking about her troubles. Whatever she'd been about to say, she swallowed it back and stayed quiet.
“Did you tell your father she's been found?” I asked Ephraim, and he gave me the reaction I wanted.
“Oh! I better go.” He loped off down the trail, thin and gangly and not particularly fast.
“Shiloh,” I said, when he was away, “who were you playing with?”
“Just the kids.” She took me in with her deep, dark eyes. “They want to know who you are.”
“My name is Ellie,” I said. “And this is Stacey. We're just taking pictures and video around here for your mom and dad.”
“Hi!” Stacey said, waving and kind of overdoing it, as bubbly as fresh-popped champagne.
Shiloh looked at her, then back to me. “Okay.”
“What kids, Shy?” I asked.
She wandered off in the direction her brother had gone, but without any sense of hurry. She veered toward the fire ring instead and walked on the circle of stone, darkened on the inside by countless years of use, though it had sat cold and empty in recent years. In past generations, it had been a gathering spot for stories and teaching, a kind of ritual space for half-grown kids who found themselves midway between the mythic imagination of childhood and the responsible buttoned-down adult world, still young enough to be innocent and wild for the summer.
“Shiloh,” I said. “What kids?”
The girl gestured vaguely around, saying nothing.
“Can you see the kids? Or hear them?”
No answer. I decided to go a different route: “Do you always see people that the rest of your family can't see?”
Shiloh didn't reply. She hummed to herself as she walked around the top of the stone ring, hands out to her sides for balance.
“Shy!” her father called as he emerged from the woods, Nate at his side, Ephraim trailing several paces behind them.
The girl didn't even look over. She was lost in her own humming, staring at the blackened ground of the fire pit as though entranced.
“Shiloh, where did you go?” Josh bellowed. His face was red, and he was fuming. He was definitely not in timeshare-selling mode. “We've been looking all over!”
Shiloh scrunched up at his voice, drawing her shoulders in and wincing as if she'd been struck.
“She was playing hide and seek,” Ephraim told his dad.
“You were supposed to be watching her!” Josh said.
“How could I watch her and read at the same time? Human eyes don't swivel independently, Dad.”
“What are you talking about, weirdo?” Nathan snorted.
“Don't start driving down Attitude Avenue, Ephraim,” Josh said. “You're grounded.”
“From what? Labor camp?” Ephraim looked at the work site around the cabin.
“Yeah, very funny, Ephraim. You're a real clown.” Josh looked our way, seemed to recall we were there, and moderated his tone. “We'll talk about this later. Take your sister home. Try not to lose her on the way.”
I was disappointed to watch Ephraim and Shiloh trudge off quietly. According to their mom, they were the two who'd most likely encountered the strange and supernatural here at the camp. I wanted to talk to them at length.
Instead, I was left with Josh, who put on his big smile and his sales voice, and Nate, who stood alongside him, arms folded in the same way, wearing a smile that was closer to a smirk. The fourteen-year-old was mainly looking at Stacey.
“Sorry about that,” Josh told me. “Shy gets off in her own world. Sometimes we have to pull her back. Anyway, how's the, uh, project looking? Think we'll get some promising video?”
“Looks very interesting so far.”
“How long do you imagine it will take to complete?” Josh asked. “Remember, I'm willing to pay extra for speed.”
“We're going as fast as we can,” I said. “Hopefully just a few days. It's hard to know at this point.”
Josh nodded, not looking satisfied by my answer. “The sooner the better. We'd better get back to the house.”
“I can come back and build a fire,” Nate said. He bit his lip, a rare sign of vulnerability from him, and shifted his gaze from Stacey to the fire pit. “If you're staying, you should have one.”
“That would be great!” Stacey said, probably just genuinely pleased by the idea of a campfire. I wish she hadn't, because I'd already opened my mouth to politely decline. After Stacey spoke, though, I didn't want to come off rude by contradicting her.
“Very generous of you, Nathan,” Josh said.
I sighed, but only inwardly. “As long as it's not too late.”
Josh and Nathan packed up their worksite, padlocking their heavier tools and generator inside a cabin before leaving.
“Let's set up before Junior Scout comes back to build you a fire,” I told Stacey.
“I think it'll be nice to have a campfire. It will really tune us into the place. At Camp Mizpah the fire was like the heart of it all. We'd gather round, drink cider, sing songs—”
“No songs. Come on. We need to keep an eye on Bobcat Cabin, too. I heard things in there.” I filled her in as we set up observation gear.
“Do you think it was the same entity from the lodge?” Stacey asked.
“I don't know; we'll compare data when we have it. But that's two encounters in less than twenty-four hours. This place is starting to look like a hotbed of paranormal activity. Now we just have to figure out why, and whether any of it threatens our clients and their kids.”
Standing inside our cabin, I adjusted the angle of the night vision camera trained on Bobcat Cabin, the one that had been mysteriously damaged in the night, the one with the invisible laughing entity who'd played its own game of hide and seek with me. Maybe I'd been part of the game with Shiloh and the ghosts of dead children, without even knowing it until it was over.
Chapter Eleven
By the time the sun was low and out of sight, we were ready. We had a camera and microphone inside Bobcat Cabin, hoping to catch some readings of the invisible giggler. We watched the outdoors by way of cameras looking out our cabin windows.
In the second bedroom of our cabin, Stacey set up tablets and a laptop as a mini-nerve center, because we couldn't bring the van any closer than the parking lot up at the lodge.
From here, we could watch the feeds from surrounding cabins, but the feeds from the lodge and the caretaker's cabin where the family lived were sporadic. The thick woods and huge hill weren't helpful. There was no WiFi around the cabins for us to piggyback on because the campers' cabins were meant to be completely screen-free; screen time was only available at the lodge and at the Conner family home.
As we finalized the second-bedroom nerve center, someone knocked on our front door.
Nate stood out there. He cast Stacey a smile and an eyebrow raise. It was pretty ridiculous. Probably worked on girls his age, though.
“I brought some serious wood,” he told her. “It's going to be a sweet fire. Probably blaze all night.”
Out at the fire ring, Ephraim was silently transferring a heap of limbs and small logs from a wheelbarrow, with the grim look of a gravedigger or a Dickensian factory worker condemned to long hours in horrible conditions.
“Looks great!” Stacey said, being way too positive about it.
“We don't want it to blaze all night,” I told Nate. “Maybe twenty, twenty-five minutes of blazing, tops.” I closed the door and sighed at Stacey. “Hopefully they have something worthwhile to tell us.”
“No need to be so glum. Just take a few minutes to kick back and enjoy the fire and the scenery.”
“You're right. I will be done with that after just a few minutes. Don't forget to refresh your bug spray.” I looked through the windows at the boys bickering with
each other as they arranged the firewood. “This seems potentially awkward.”
“I thought we'd want to hear from all the family members.”
“And we do. So let's get it over with.”
“That's not a happy camper attitude!” Stacey said. “Let's approach this challenge with Mizpah confidence and Mizpah cheer!”
“I'll handle the confidence, you handle the cheer. Just get them talking about ghosts if you can.”
“No problemo.”
We went out to join them. I sat on a boulder while Nate worked to light the tepee of kindling he'd built. Ephraim waved his phone around, trying unsuccessfully to find a signal. He was clearly only there because there was nothing else to do.
“Nice work,” Stacey told Nate as the younger but more muscular boy started the fire. “Have you done a lot of camping?”
“Yeah, Boy Scouts,” Nate said. “I'm working towards Eagle Scout. College admissions lap that stuff up like thirsty poodles. But Effie quit scouting back in Webelos. No college application fatteners for him.”
“Don't call me Effie,” Ephraim muttered, almost robotically, like he'd said it a thousand times before.
“Effie Effingham.” Nate smirked, and Ephraim replied with a rude hand gesture. Nate looked at Stacey. “Don't mind my brother. He's a class-W weirdo. He's probably scared to talk to you because you're a girl.”
“Shut up, Nathan.”
“Ooh, I'm shaking in my shorts,” Nate said. “What are you going to do, Effie, whine at me?”
“Maybe we should leave,” I said, rising from my boulder. It was after nightfall. Darkness gathered around us on all sides, beyond the circle of the fire's red glow, like black curtains closing over the campground.
“No! Hey, it's fine.” Nate jumped up from his crouch near the fire and stepped over to me. I almost thought he would grab my arm, but he didn't. He spoke in a smooth, calming tone like I was a nervous horse on the verge of panicking, or a potential sucker trying to leave his pyramid scheme presentation early. “Everything's cool here. We'll be chill and have fun. Y'all stay.”
“Why don't you guys tell us more about the camp?” Stacey asked.
“You mean you haven't heard enough from my dad?” Nate hurried to give Stacey his full attention. He returned to his seat, a sideways slab of tree trunk the size of a park bench. “I figured he'd be loading you down with stories about the old days.”
“Not really. The old days?” I asked. “What do you mean by that? The camp's history?”
“Right. When he used to come here every summer. He took the archery first-place ribbon—”
“—two years in a row,” Ephraim interrupted, his voice barely a mumble.
“Is that why your father wanted this place, you think?” I asked, stunned by this new information. “Because he came here as a kid?”
“Oh, yeah,” Nathan said. “Mom wanted this big farm near Lake Hartwell but Dad was like, no, this is the spot. Dad even sings the song when we're out working on stuff. 'Old Stony Owl... stand watchful, nosy, and true—'”
“Noble,” Ephraim said. “Nosy doesn't even make sense.”
“Who cares? Stacey, Ellie, ladies, have some marshmallows.” Nathan reached for the cooler, and of course Stacey agreed, and soon they were both roasting the puffy sugary lumps over the flames. Nate held his up like a torch when it caught fire, shriveling and blackening inside its nimbus of raw flame. “Check that out!” he shouted; he couldn't have been more enthusiastic if he were watching a giant fireworks display. His energy was almost infectious.
I looked over at Ephraim, who was quietly rolling a small rock between his fingers, staring at it intently, in the manner of a kid bored out of his mind. The red light of the fire overtook the paleness of his face and the redness of his acne, giving him a different look. Healthier.
“So what can you tell us about this place, Ephraim?” I asked.
“I don't know.” He looked up at me briefly, but his gaze quickly skittered off me and out toward the ever-darkening woods. Night had definitely fallen now. “It's old.”
“Oh, is it old?” Nate mocked his older brother's voice. “Wow, they could never have figured out it was old. There's only a museum about how old it is.”
Ephraim just glared at him, seemingly unable to respond.
“This place is kinda spooky to me,” Stacey said. “When I was a kid, my summer camp had a legend about a camper that died on the archery course. They said you could sometimes see her out at night, with the arrow still stuck in her chest, still bleeding. Arrowhead Annie. If you didn't get away fast, she'd shoot you, too.” She paused and looked out into the woods. “Have you ever wondered if this place was haunted?”
“Well, our dad did tell us the one legend,” Ephraim said. “The story is that the Stony Owl is really a graveyard for old Native American warriors, and one of them was assigned to guard Stony Owl for all time. So he walks the trails at night, and anyone who goes up there and gets too close to the owl... well, he hunts them down, because he's a master hunter, and then he hacks them to pieces. They call him the Trailwalker. And if you go sneaking up to the owl late at night, he'll get you. Once he starts tracking you, he never stops. Not until you're dead. He'll even follow you home, no matter how far it is.”
“Yeah, right.” Nate shook his head and slurped down his second charred marshmallow. “There's nothing scary about this place. Effy got scared when we moved here, though.” He snickered and jabbed two marshmallows onto the tip of his extendable steel roasting stick. His mouth was ringed with white goop and black crust.
“Really?” I looked at Ephraim with interest while trying to sound casual. “Have you seen anything strange since moving here?”
“Oh, yeah,” Nate snickered. “Every time he looks in the mirror.”
“Shut up, Nathan,” Ephraim grumbled, without much force at all.
“That's all you ever say,” Nathan replied. “'Shut up. Shut up.' Like you want everyone to act like you, sitting around being quiet and creepy and staring at people.”
“I'm not staring at anyone.”
“You're being creepy though.”
“This is stupid. I'm going home.” Ephraim stood up and trudged away.
“Good,” Nathan said. “You're embarrassing me anyway. You always have to complain and kill any fun. You suck the fun out of everything, every time. Party killer!”
“What party?” Ephraim tossed over his shoulder.
“I'll walk with you.” I jogged over to join Ephraim. He wasn't moving very fast.
“Good idea, he might get scared by himself,” Nathan said.
“No, I won't.” Ephraim picked up the pace.
“I wanted to hear what you were going to say,” I told him as we followed the wooded trail from the campground to the lake, in a low voice so his brother couldn't hear.
“Wasn't going to say anything.” He kept his eyes on the trail ahead, lit by his flashlight.
“About something scaring you here at the campground.”
“No. I wasn't scared. My brother's just stupid.”
“But something did happen?” I felt like I was grasping at straws on a cart that was pulling away. “Something unusual? I want to hear.”
“No. I mean maybe I thought I saw somebody, but they weren't there. It couldn't have been real anyway.”
“That sounds interesting. What did you see?”
“Doesn't matter.”
“I'd really like to hear it.”
“Why?”
“I like ghost stories.”
He slowed down and looked over at me, like he was trying to tell if I was kidding or not.
“Okay,” he said. “It wasn't far from here, actually. I was out here walking after dinner one night, because I really needed space from everyone.”
“Totally understandable.”
We walked around the lake, keeping back to avoid the muddy shore.
“Up here.” He pointed to the trail marked Stony Owl Effigy. “That's where I s
aw it.”
“What did you see?” I pointed my flashlight up the steep trail, thinking of our walk up there with Allison.
“First, I heard a strange howl,” he said. “Then something running toward me from the woods. And then, whoa! A pack of werewolves with glowing red eyes. Riding, um, motorcycles.”
“Uh-huh.”
“I'm just kidding. I haven't really seen anything. But it's definitely weird out here, isn't it? Like you can almost...”
“Almost what?”
“I don't know. It's just, well, if you go outside alone late at night, when everyone else is asleep, just look around and listen. It's like there really is something out there watching you. I don't mean the owls and junk, you know there's going to be animals out there. But it's kind of like... did you ever read Lord of the Flies in school?”
“I did.”
“It's like the beast, the one nobody sees but everybody feels. The one the hunters make sacrifices to. When I look out in the woods at night, that's what it feels like. The beast.”
His description chilled me. I thought of the large, unexplained cold spot that moved objects in the lodge attic. I also thought of boys trapped in the wild on a remote island, their attempts at peace and civilization crumbling as they watched the wilderness for a nameless evil.
“That can't be a pleasant feeling,” I said.
“Well, in the book, the beast wasn't real,” he said. “Or it was real but it was inside the boys. They brought the evil with them. Right?”
“Yeah. I think that's right.”
“So I tell myself it's in my head, like in that book, but that doesn't feel completely right. But it doesn't feel completely wrong, either.” He slowed as the path reached the sprawling caretaker's cottage, the building that had grown too large over the years to really call a cottage, but in such slapdash and mismatched fashion that it was hard to call it anything fancier.
“Personally,” I said, “I believe in ghosts. So if you ever want to talk about anything, I'll listen.”
“Ever?” He stopped short of the long rectangles of light cast from the glowing windows of the cottage. The clearing around it had no real lawn, just gravel and raised garden beds full of weeds, their wooden retaining walls crumbling. “How long are you staying? I thought you were just making a commercial.”
