SLEEPY HOLLOW: General of the Dead (Jason Crane Book 3)

by Gleaves, Richard

  The ground dipped as the swamp of her memory gathered her in. She trailed fireflies, like a comet—like some hard and pitted ball of ice and rock, hurtling along its implacable course, century after century, unable to stop, caught by the pull of its old loop, forever.

  Zef waited in Patriots Park. His alarm had set his path. He saw them coming. A crowd of shuffling figures, difficult to make out. But there was no mistaking the clop of a rider on a red-eyed horse. Or the blue figure resolving through the shadows: Kate, in bridal white and trailing fireflies. He steeled himself and stepped into the road.

  “Son?” Hadewych gasped, ripping off his mask.

  “I’ve looked for you everywhere!” he whined.

  “We might say the same of you,” said Agathe, throwing back her veil. “You ran again.”

  “What do you mean?” snapped Zef. “Back at the house? I didn’t run. I sacrificed myself to buy you time. Didn’t I, Dad?’

  Hadewych gave a nod. “He was very brave.”

  “Then those men were shooting and I turned around and… you guys ditched me!”

  Agathe came to Zef and took his hand. “Oh, child. We would never… ditch… you.”

  “You almost got me killed. But… it’s okay, Grandma.” He kissed her cheek. “I forgive you.”

  “Death is nothing,” she said, and her fireflies twinkled around her. “Even if you had been killed, you would still be welcome at my side.”

  Zef felt a chill.

  She caressed him, and he forced himself not to flinch. “Come along.”

  “Where to?”

  “To where the magic is.” She began walking again, lowering her veil. Lisa Mayfair mirrored her stride, bearing the reliquary. “To my millpond.”

  “There are people at the millpond. Tonight’s the Great Jack-O’-Lantern Blaze.”

  “Good God,” whispered Hadewych.

  “A jack-o’-lantern blaze?” Agathe laughed. “Oh, that will be delicious. I know just the spell. I carved the first jack-o’-lantern, you know. The first in the Americas. I’ve studied their lore. I love them. So does my Horseman. Don’t you, dear?” She touched the reliquary, raising red sparks that singed Lisa Mayfair’s clothes. “They are lanterns for souls. As we all are. We are all little lights, Dylan. Little fireflies, trapped inside. Tap tap tap. Until some kind stranger opens a vein… to help us escape…”

  Zef stepped in behind her, walking with the shuffling crowd, gasping at the sight of Jessica and Valerie blank-faced and lost. He noticed the deep scars on Eddie’s back for the first time, thinking of Hadewych’s belt. Zef flinched—first at the smell of an animated corpse; then at the brush of a white mannequin; then at the touch of his father, who’d slipped a hand into his own.

  “What are you up to?” whispered Hadewych.

  “We have to fight her.”

  Some ten feet ahead, Agathe stopped. Had she heard? She turned to study the Captors’ Monument, a bronze soldier on a pillar of stone.

  “This is where they caught Andre!” she said, delighted. “He was smuggling secrets for Benedict Arnold.” She pointed. “And look. There was the hanging tree. That does bring back memories.” She gave Zef a slow smile, dripping honey and bee-sting. “Death is the proper punishment for spycraft, don’t you think?”

  “Sure,” whispered Zef.

  She beckoned and turned, and her army marched on Philipsburg Manor.

  “Nine-thirty tickets! Nine-thirty tickets!” announced the DJ. “And another trivia question! How many daggers did Mr. Thorn need to kill the Antichrist in The Omen? Anybody?”

  Jill Rittermeyer bent down and nudged her little boy. “You know that one, honey. I know you know that one.”

  “I don’t like that movie,” whispered Buddy Rittermeyer.

  “Yes you do. You and Daddy used to watch it all the time. Tell the contest-man how many daggers. He’s giving away a baseball cap.”

  Buddy didn’t want a baseball cap. Baseball caps made him think of his daddy. David Rittermeyer had worn baseball caps a lot, to hide his little bald spot. Buddy and his daddy had watched The Omen that night. The movie night when Daddy’s head and ball cap and bald spot got cut off. Buddy felt shivery, like he was going to start bawling. He screwed his face up and stared at the back of the man ahead of them in line. His jacket was a Harley-Davidson jacket. Those jackets were cool. Cycle guys were tough. But not tougher than monsters.

  Mr. Thorn had seven daggers. Buddy did know that. Seven mystical daggers of Meggido to kill his son with. Seven daggers to stop the Devil. But Mr. Thorn got killed before he could do it. Shot in the church. Bang bang. Dead. The Devil won. Nothing’s stronger than the Devil. The Devil always wins. Except in Omen III, but Buddy had never liked Omen III.

  Buddy couldn’t drink his cider, or eat the cookie his mom had shoved into his hand. He was too nervous. And it was a sugar cookie with a grinning skull face. It was daring him to bite it, and then it would bite him back. He found a trash can and threw the cookie in.

  “I saw that, young man. That cost me three dollars. I would have eaten it. You know money’s tight.”

  “Sorry, Mama.”

  Yeah, Buddy knew money was tight. Ever since Daddy died. His mama had put the house by Fremont Pond up for sale and had taken a job down in New York. She worried for money, he knew. And she was lonely now. She needed a boyfriend. He tried not to make his mama worry more. He knew he’d changed. Buddy had lost his daddy and he didn’t like Halloween anymore, though it had always been his favorite. He used to love the lantern tours and Horseman’s Hollow and the candy and the trick-or-treating and the costumes. But he’d never wear his skeleton suit again. No sir. He’d never watch another spooky movie either. There’s things you love in make-believe, but as soon as they’re real—bam. Nope. He’d told his mama what he’d seen that night—the Headless Horseman and the rotted horse with all the flies—but she didn’t believe him. She thought he was loco in the noggin. Buddy called it that. She didn’t. She’d talked to Aunt Marcia on the phone and used words like “traumatized” and “borderline autistic” and “Asperger’s.” “Loco” was better though. Like locomotive. Like going someplace else. Like not here.

  “You promise this isn’t scary?” he whispered for the dozenth time.

  “It’s pretty,” Mama said. “It’s for charity. Don’t you want to help those poor people? We all live here.”

  “Give ’em money then. I don’t like the pumpkins. The pumpkins are scary.”

  “The pumpkins are beautiful! Wait till you see.”

  She took Buddy’s hand and they got their tickets swiped by the big man in black. Buddy balked at the wooden gate but she tugged him along. Lanterns marked the path around the millpond. Buddy didn’t like the look of the millpond. The big pumpkin raft looked weird, and he sure didn’t like the look of that old manor house. Lit green from below, with two open window-eyes with lanterns in them. Like that other movie he and his daddy had always watched. Amityville Horror. Oh, why had he watched so many spooky movies?

  He balked again as they reached the wooden bridge for walking across the river. “No. No. No. It’s the Headless Horseman Bridge, Mama!”

  “And what do they say? Once you cross over, his power ends. Right?”

  “You don’t know that.”

  “That’s what the story says.”

  “Maybe they made it up. Maybe that’s not how it works. Maybe—”

  “Buddy, people are behind us. Sorry, girls.” She stepped aside to let a pair of high school girls pass. “If you want to go back, we can go back. But I’m worried for you. Where’s my old Buddy? Where’s my spooky little guy? Why can’t you have fun anymore? I know Daddy’s gone, but you got to live. Everything will be okay and nothing scary will happen tonight.”

  “Promise?”

  “On my life.”

  Buddy took a deep breath and walked into the Blaze.

  Spooky wind-chimey music played from speakers in the bushes. Buddy made a face and hoped his mama didn’t se
e it. He was already scared. He didn’t like that music. It was the kind of music they played when people go down into cellars and drop their flashlights and you just know know know that something’s going to jump out. When you hear music like that you cover your face ’cause something scary’s lurking. Daddy always let Buddy know when the scary parts were over. How would Buddy know now? Who knew? Who knew how long the scariness went? Who’d tell him when it was safe to look again? Mama would be mad if he covered his eyes. She’d spent money.

  The man in the Harley jacket had hurried ahead. Now they were walking behind the two girls. They were giggly, talking about Ouija boards and spooks. Buddy didn’t want to listen to that talk. Ouija boards were scary and not to be trifled with. He wished they’d shut up.

  Buddy cringed as they passed through the little graveyard of green-lit headstones. But they were okay. He knew them. Props from Horseman’s Hollow. He’d been to the Hollow plenty of times. It was good. It was fun. And the skeletons weren’t scary. They were made of plastic. The old hearse was there—not scary. It just looked that way ’cause of the green light behind it, and the fog.

  He tugged at his mama’s hand. “Nothing’s going to jump at us, right?”

  “No, baby. Not this year.”

  They passed the pumpkin-headed scarecrows. No zombies. No monsters. The three scarecrows were grinning. See no evil. Hear no evil. Speak no evil. Only the last one was creepy. His jawbone had come off. But Buddy hurried up and passed him by.

  The Blaze was all about pumpkins. There were thousands of them. In the trees and on stands. He found himself grinning just a little. He liked the goofy pumpkins and the happy pumpkins. He looked in and saw little candles. They smelled good too. But not all the pumpkins were happy. There were monster pumpkins and skull pumpkins and fanged pumpkins and mean pumpkins. Pumpkins with slanty eyebrows and evil little eyes. He pressed his lips together. His shoulders came up toward his ears.

  Up ahead was a huuuuuge tree with pumpkins hanging from it. Like the Halloween Tree in that story. Daddy gave Buddy that book. Buddy loved that book. He wanted to be Jack Skelton, wearing his bones on the outside. The Halloween Tree at the Blaze was lit with orange and red. The pumpkins were rocking a little, and there were crows in the tree. Ugly black crows, pecking at the pumpkin guts, sticking their beaks into the eyes to peck them out. Buddy didn’t like it. Those crows kept pecking.

  “See no evil,” he whispered as his mom pulled him along. “See no evil. See no evil.” He squeezed his eyes shut, not looking at the pumpkins, trusting his mama to keep him going right.

  There was a poem in the Halloween Tree book but he couldn’t remember it. He made one up as he walked blindly on.

  Orange pumpkins swinging up high

  Letting the birds come peck ’em in the eye

  If you got no eyes, then how can you see?

  Swinging up there in the Halloween Tree?

  “See no evil… see no evil…”

  Pumpkins are nice and pumpkins are funny

  Gotta keep walkin’ ’cause Mama spent money

  But I’ll keep my eyes shut so they won’t get me

  The scary pumpkins in the Halloween Tree…

  “See no evil… see no evil…”

  He was starting his third verse, Pumpkins don’t kill you and pumpkins don’t bite… when his arm got yanked ’cause Mama stopped walking. He blinked and looked up at her. She was stupid-faced and staring at one of the dangling pumpkins, eye to eye.

  “So pretty…” she said.

  “Come on, Mama.” Buddy tugged her arm. She kept staring into the pumpkin’s eyes. The whole line had stopped moving. People were just looking at the pumpkins, like they’d never seen one before. Buddy didn’t want to look at pumpkins. He wanted to go. Couldn’t they just go? “Mama, what are you doing?”

  The pumpkins weren’t glowing orange anymore. They were glowing blue. Blue scary fire, like the pilot light on the stove. The stove was dangerous. Buddy didn’t like this blue fire. No. No. No. It reflected in his mama’s eyes, then burst out of his mama’s eyes.

  “Mama!” he screamed. Her eyes were on fire! His mama’s eyes were on fire and smoking! “Help! Help!” He tried to pull loose but she gripped his hand tight. It hurt, like the time Buddy got his finger caught in the door and lost a fingernail. “What’s happening?”

  All the people’s eyes were on fire, like they had flamethrowers in their heads. The fire poured out of their mouths and noses—they were all pumpkin-headed evil flamey-eyed monsters! Buddy freaked, yanked his hand loose and fell down in the mud. The pumpkins in the tree were spinning and burning and blue-eyed and trying to get his attention. He couldn’t look! They’d get him too! He covered his face. Someone grabbed his arm. It was Mama.

  “Look at the pretty pumpkins, baby.” The words came out with smoke and sparks. Buddy flipped over and wriggled away from her, pushing through the people all burning from their eyes and mouths. Were they burning? Was everybody burning up? Did their brains catch fire and cook? Could brains do that?

  He wriggled into the bushes, keeping his eyes shut. Somebody caught his ankle and tore his shoe off. But he got away from them and climbed over a little fence, landing with a whump in the slave garden, and hid behind a big spider web made out of stitched-together pumpkins. The big scary manor house was right above him, and the lanterns in the windows were burning blue now. Blue like the pumpkins and the people and his mama. He couldn’t look. He couldn’t look. He squinted through the spider-pumpkin-web, breathing hard. All the people were blue-fire-eyed. Nobody was moving. He wanted to scream for help, but he was scared somebody might come. Come and cook his brains. He covered his face.

  Pumpkins don’t kill you and pumpkins don’t bite

  Pumpkins aren’t blue like the pilot light

  Mama’s just playing a trick on me

  But I’m not scared. No Buddy’s not scared. I’m really, really scared!

  Of the Halloween… Halloween…. Halloween… Halloween…

  Someone was laughing and Buddy looked up through the spider web, shaking like a leaf. Who was laughing? One of the pumpkins? Out on the raft? No—there was a girl on the dam, walking across it. A pretty blond girl in a wedding dress. She was leading a horse. A black horse with scary eyes. Scary red eyes, like the scary blue eyes… There was a man on the horse and he didn’t have a shirt on and the dam shook a little as the horse clopped across and the girl got over to Buddy’s side and there was the throne of the Devil there, eight feet up, with the bat wings and the spooky green light on it, and there was a Devil-faced pumpkin scarecrow in the Devil’s throne and the girl snapped her fingers and…

  … the Devil got up.

  The Devil got up for her.

  And gave her his chair.

  The Devil scarecrow-blue-eyed-pumpkin-headed monster climbed off of the throne and gave the girl a bow and the girl raised her arms and she floated up and was flying and sat in the throne and she was laughing, laughing! And then she yanked the reins and the man on the horse fell off hard in the gravel and let out a yow and there were other people walking across the bridge but they didn’t have scary blue eyes, they were just people, staring and scared like Buddy, and Buddy got even more scared when the black horse jumped the fence and landed in the garden with him. Buddy flipped over onto his back in the mud and the horse was right there and it sniffed at muddy Buddy and looked down with its big red eyes and Buddy covered his head, thinking of the horse and the flies and his daddy being dead and oh, my mamamamamama I don’t like the Pumpkin Blaze!

  The blond girl laughed again.

  “Now,” she said, crossing her legs. “Who shall we bleed first?”

  CHAPTER SIXTY-EIGHT

  “Infiltration”

  Jason ran the BMW’s heater as hard as he could and held his glowing hands to the air vents. He’d been out of the aqueduct for an hour but his hands were still prune-y. That made them glow weird, like a disco ball. Joey kept saying it distracted him from his driving. J
ason tented his orange Horseman-logo sweatshirt and let the air warm his stomach. “I feel like I’ll never be dry again.”

  “How did you get out?” said Joey, drumming his fingers on the steering wheel.

  “Open grate, right at the end of the damn tunnel. I’m lucky the house I broke into didn’t have a burglar alarm.” He adopted a broad southern sheriff accent. ‘Whose bones are these, son?’ ‘Oh, these? They’re witch bones, officer. You see, I collect witch bones as a hobby…’”

  “You sound messed up, man.”

  “I’m tired. I’m punchy. I just performed breaking and entering.”

  “You flashed the glass back, so it’s just entering. You didn’t take anything. Stop acting like you robbed a bank.”

  Jason put the seat back and stuck a bare foot up to the heater vent. “Sorry. I gotta get dry or go nuts.”

  “Holy crap. Your feet are enormous.”

  “Shut up.”

  “I’m buyin’ sunglasses if those start glowing.”

  Jason smiled a little at the joke but turned to the window and felt his cheeks go slack. They were close to the Hollow now. The windows of all the houses were dark. The trees were long-armed and empty-handed, beseeching the night sky. Yeah. They’d returned to their blighted little world.

  “Tonight’s the night, Joey.”

  “You don’t know that. Maybe you heard Agathe wrong. Maybe…”

  “No. Look.” He pointed to the sky. A splash of red had appeared on the full moon.

  “Shit,” Joey whispered.

  “Tonight’s the night.” He adopted a spooky voice. “A blood moon has risen, and the celestial omens are favorable for sorcery.” He wiggled his toes in the hot air from the vent. “But you know what a red moon is, man? It’s just an eclipse. The moon’s behind the Earth, but it’s partial. It’s getting the light that passes through our atmosphere. Red-shifted light. All our sun-ups and sunsets. That’s all it is. There’s nothing magic about it.”