by K. J. Emrick
All she needed was the way. What was the way?
Darcy thought back to her dream. What had Millie said about the way?
Something that didn’t make any sense. Something about how the way was right where it belongs and it was better off where it was. No. Not better. That wasn’t the word she had used.
“Are you okay, Darcy?” Jon asked her, which she thought was a stupid question under the circumstances. “Your hand is bleeding. Let’s take care of that.”
“Shh,” she said. “Hold on. I’m trying to remember something.”
Not better. Aunt Millie had said something else. Millie had said, and it was where it needed to be now.
That wasn’t it, either. Not exactly, anyway. In a dream like that, one that connected her to the realm of the dead, anything that was said could have a very specific meaning. She would need to remember the exact words if she was going to figure out what Millie had been trying to tell her.
She held up her right hand, saw the blood. There didn’t seem to be any glass in the cuts, which was good, but she was right handed and it was going to be a pain to have it wrapped up while she was performing an exorcism or whatever else she would need to do. Why did it need to be her right hand?
Wait.
That was it. That was what Millie had said to her. Right. She had told Darcy that the way was where it had always been, and it was right where it belonged.
On her right hand, the antique silver ring that Millie had passed down to Darcy sat in its place on her finger. On her right hand.
It was right, where it belonged.
The way. This was the way.
The ring had an odd geometrical design of curves and angles circling it, and a tiny rose crafted by some master metal smith to look so real it was like a tiny blossom had been caught in the metal itself. Darcy had often wondered at the designs on the ring. There was nothing in Millie’s journal or any of her other books about it. It had simply been a unique piece of jewelry, a stunning memory of the aunt who had raised her for most of her formative years.
Only now, looking at it again in light of the communication method she had read through, she could see the ring for what it was. It was a sculpted path, a representation of the way the exorcised spirit had to be forced away from this mortal coil so that it could not find its way back.
It was the way.
Clenching her hand into a tight fist, she breathed a few silent words. “Thank you, Millie.”
She knew how to do it now.
She was ready.
Chapter Seven
When Darcy had told Jon that she’d never performed an exorcism, she’d told him the truth. There had been a few people in town or as far away as Inglesburg who thought their houses were haunted and thought they needed an exorcism. Sometimes, to make them feel better, Darcy had made up a ritual cleansing on the spot. She would throw some salt, walk through the house reciting Latin or gibberish even, and then walk away declaring the house clean.
A bit dramatic, but every time she’d done it the families in those houses never had a problem with their “ghost” again. Probably because it had only been the product of an overactive imagination coupled with the sounds of a house settling.
Doing a real exorcism, on a specter as powerful as the Pilgrim Ghost, would require a lot of energy and willpower. Which was why she opted to go to bed before she fell asleep on the floor.
After repairing the salt lines and making sure all the windows and doors were locked, Darcy had stumbled. Jon had been exactly two steps behind her the whole time and had been there to catch her. In actuality, her knees had buckled from exhaustion, but she wasn’t going to tell him that. He was worried about her enough as it was. She also wasn’t going to argue with him when he told her to take her clothes off and get in bed.
Dreams came and went, and she knew some of them came from her Aunt Millie even though she didn’t appear in any of them personally. There were some about her childhood, her mother and father and sister. Smudge walked through several of them as his normal cat self. A few were close to nightmares, made up of worries about what would happen if they couldn’t stop Nathaniel Williams.
If he killed anyone else.
She was watching Williams’ hanging in one of the dreams. It was the scene from the painting in Benson’s book, only it was so very real. She saw Williams swinging from his gallows rope. She saw the look of satisfaction on the faces of the people around him, heard the insults they hurled at him. Over in the corner, the grandfather clock ticked its way toward midnight, the second hand moving steadily around until it was right at the cusp of striking the witching hour.
Then it stopped, and the clock’s mechanisms broke with a loud sproing.
11:59.
Nathaniel Williams stopped kicking. His body lay still and limp where it hung. He was dead.
Through the crowd came Whitmarsh Grace. Darcy had never seen a picture of him but she knew instinctively that this was her distant ancestor, the man who had sent Nathaniel Williams to his death. He was tall and lean, with the hard look of someone who would just as soon shoot you now and ask questions of your corpse. He tipped a wide black hat to another man in the crowd, a portly gentleman in a black coat with long tails who gave the impression of being the leader of the group.
A wooden ladder was brought forth and Whitmarsh climbed up to the beam that supported the dead man on his rope. From his belt he unsheathed a long, thick knife and Darcy thought the dream would show him cutting Nathaniel Williams down. Instead, he began carving into the beam. Intricate designs that matched the ones in the painting. The same pattern in her ring.
“What art thou about up there, Whitmarsh?” the portly man asked.
“Can’t risk that his spirit might hold us ill,” Whitmarsh answered. “I know a bit of spellwork from my mother. This will keep his spirit from finding his way back and haunting us here.”
In the dream, Darcy looked down at the ring on her hand. Whitmarsh’s carvings were close. Close, but he had missed a vital line. Without that one part of the way, Whitmarsh’s ghost would be free to come back. Darcy’s ancestor had made a mistake.
Now they were dealing with the results.
After that she slept soundly for hours. The dreams were all done. Whatever they had to tell her had already been told and she was left to herself for a while. Eventually she woke up from that peaceful, dark oblivion, slowly coming around enough to realize it was one o’clock in the afternoon. When it dawned on her that it was a week day, she sat up in a panic, thinking about how her store needed to be opened and she needed to check on Grace and Aaron and Helen and…
“Ohh,” she groaned, not sure if her stomach or her head hurt worse. The aches in her muscles were just faint reminders of something she’d rather forget. Her right hand had been wrapped in gauze that showed faint spots of red here and there. Everything else was tolerable, but her stomach and her skull were holding Olympic tryouts to see which could cause her the most grief. The judges were still conferring.
Darcy studied her hand, with the makeshift bandage on it, and smiled at Jon’s handiwork. Not bad. The cuts would heal over quickly and she still had use of her hand even though two of the fingers were bandaged up like a mummy’s. She looked over her ring again, seeing the way etched into it even better now that her mind was clearer.
“There you are.” Jon’s voice sounded relieved as he stopped to lean in the bedroom door. He was wearing dark dress pants and a blue shirt with a stiff collar. Work clothes. He noticed her looking him over. “I had to go into the station this morning. I wanted to know where they were with the investigation. Chief Daleson told me to take the rest of the day off, though. I told him you weren’t feeling well. He didn’t argue with me.”
“Gee, thanks,” she said, happy that she could provide him with an excuse to play hooky. She couldn’t disagree with what he’d said, though. She felt horrible. “I need to check in with my job, too. I have a bookstore to run, you know.”
“Iz
zy has it,” he told her, meaning her one and only employee. “I talked to her this morning. She’s got everything covered.”
Darcy knew she could trust Izzy. She’d come to rely on her friend more and more since they’d started working together. Now that she knew the store was covered, she could focus on other things.
Like how empty her stomach was.
A loud rumbling in her belly was followed by cramps that twisted her insides. “Unh,” she complained. “I need to eat. Like, a lot. But I want to check on Grace and the others first. They need to know what’s going on. About the ghost, I mean. And, well, me.”
About her being moved up to number one on the suspect list, she kept herself from adding out loud.
“It’s okay,” Jon said to her. He stepped away from the door and came to sit down next to her on the bed. Darcy didn’t know if maybe he was speaking to her silent fears. “I invited everyone here for dinner. I figured that way we’d all be together in one place, and we could let everyone know what happened.”
“You didn’t tell them yet?”
He shrugged. “It didn’t seem like the kind of thing to talk about over the phone.”
“Good point.” Her stomach growled at her again. “Um. Maybe I could get a snack before dinner?”
Leaning in to kiss her cheek, he finally smiled. “For you, Sweet Baby, anything.”
Her nickname from his lips made her feel a little better. Even in the middle of a dangerous situation that none of them could tell anyone about, she and Jon could remain a strong team.
They had made it past their rough patch, when everything seemed to be going wrong for them. Bad choices, egos, fate. All of it. Now that they were back together they could face anything.
“Come on,” he said. “I’ll help you downstairs. Then I’ll make you the best turkey sandwich you’ve ever had.”
***
Jon had asked that everyone meet at five o’clock, a little earlier than they usually had dinner but it seemed like a good idea to have everyone together before the sun started to set. Darcy had to agree with him. She doubted any of them would be comfortable out in the dark of night. Not now.
Not that it mattered. Grace and Aaron dropped by shortly after three o’clock. Aaron looked a little sheepish, and Grace tried to explain it away by saying she was dying to know what was going on with the investigation down at the police station. Darcy knew better, though.
They spaced themselves out on the couch and in the two comfortable easy chairs in the living room. They’d replaced their old chairs just last week, and these new ones were gray suede, comfortable and homey. Aaron almost fell into one, his eyes drooping heavily.
“He’s been up all night,” Grace explained in a whisper as she handed baby Addison over to sit in her auntie Darcy’s lap. “He wouldn’t even come lay down in bed.”
“I was worried,” Aaron said. “And I’m tired, not deaf.”
Grace rolled her eyes, but Darcy could tell that she loved Aaron for wanting to protect her and their new baby.
While Grace and Jon discussed the details of Bonnie Verhault’s death, at least as far as the officers of the Misty Hollow Police Department understood them, Darcy rocked Addison gently in her arms. Such a pretty baby. Grace and Aaron had done a great thing in bringing this little life into the world. She couldn’t help but think that maybe she and Jon could do the same, soon, if their plans for the wedding ever fleshed themselves out.
She was reminded again of that moment during Nathaniel Williams’ manifestation at Helen’s house when she had been sure that baby Addison was communicating with her. There had been this sensation of hearing someone speaking, crying out for help, and it hadn’t been any of the adults. Had she imagined it?
In the hospital, when Grace had just given birth and Darcy had seen Addison for the first time, there had been this instant sense of connection between them. After considering that feeling from every possible angle Darcy had come to a single conclusion. It seemed the family gift had been passed down to Grace’s baby. Addison had a connection to the paranormal just like Darcy did.
That little fact was something that Darcy was still keeping secret, waiting for a good time to let Grace know what her baby would become, but it was just as much a part of Addison as her ten fingers and ten toes were. So, if this beautiful little baby had that gift, why shouldn’t she be able to communicate with Darcy? Even if it was only telepathically.
“Can you hear me, Addison?” she whispered, looking into the child’s wide blue eyes. “Can you talk to Aunt Darcy?”
“Sis?” Grace asked her, interrupting her efforts to reach out to Addison. “You okay?”
“Sure,” she said quickly. “Just having a moment with my niece. What were we talking about?”
“What else?” Grace said wryly. “We’re talking about that dead girl. Jon says that the guys down at the station have notified her next of kin and touched base with her employer. She was here in Misty Hollow on business, scouting a location for a client. A land purchase.”
“Right.” Darcy picked up the explanation from there. “The whole deal with Nathaniel Williams is that he thought all of the area in and around Misty Hollow belonged to him. He felt strongly enough about it to get himself hung fighting over it. It makes sense that his ghost has the same unresolved issues.”
“Okay, fine, I’ll play along,” Grace said, nervously pulling at the tips of her fingers. “This ghost has problems. Big, major problems that make him homicidal.” She saw the look Darcy gave her and quickly added, “This is your area, Darcy. I’m not doubting you. It’s just a lot to swallow. Anyway. The ghost wants everyone to pay for being mean to him and taking away his property. Fine. Why is he coming out now? Why not a hundred years ago? Or fifty or ten, or whatever. Why now?”
“That’s a good question,” Darcy said. “I’m not sure I know the whole answer, but I think it has something to do with history. There are families in Misty Hollow who are descendants of the original settlers. Williams’ group. It turns out, the elected lawman who arrested and then hung Williams was our ancestor. Whitmarsh Grace. You know that whole thing about mom’s side of the family descending from the Streeters, who descended from the Graces?”
Her sister nodded along with the story. “I remember. Wow. I didn’t realize law enforcement went that far back in our family tree.”
Darcy tickled baby Addison’s chin and managed a laugh. “All the way back to the beginning. Guess it’s in your genes. So, if he’s coming out now, it might have something to do with our connection to the town’s history. If enough pieces fall back into place, it can raise a troubled spirit. Whitmarsh Grace was the lawman at the time, you’re in law enforcement now. Plus I’m engaged to Jon, and I get myself involved in his work more often than not.”
“Thankfully for me,” Jon added.
Darcy stuck her tongue out at him before continuing. “So there’s that, but also there’s how Williams believed the town was stolen from him way back then, and how someone is buying up land in the town now. There’s a lot of parallels in play here and I’m betting there’s even more to it. Another connection or two that tugged at the Pilgrim Ghost somehow.”
“That’s all well and good,” Jon said, “but it doesn’t help us. For whatever reason, he’s here now, and we need to stop him. Darcy has figured out a way to do it.”
He explained everything that had happened to them here as quickly as he could. The book, Darcy’s possession, all of it. When he was done, the room was as silent as a tomb. Even Aaron sat up wide eyed, his exhaustion forgotten.
“Wow, sis,” Grace said at last. “That’s…I don’t know what to call what that is.”
“Saying it sucks just about covers it,” she offered.
“That’s why you’ve got the salt laid out across your doorstep?” Grace looked over at the living room windows to see the salt lines there, too. She knew enough about Darcy’s gift to know what that meant. “You know, I nearly stepped in that. You could warn a person.�
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“So when do we do this ritual?” Aaron asked. “If we have a way to stop this thing, then let’s do it.”
“We will,” Darcy assured him. “But we need to do it at the Town Hall. And we’ll need to do it when no one else is around. So, we’ll have to wait until tonight.”
“Great,” Grace muttered, pretty much summing up what all of them were thinking.
“Why the Town Hall?” Aaron asked. “You can’t just do it from here? Aren’t we protected from that…ghost, as long as we’re in this house?”
Darcy wished it were that simple. “We are, but the thing is we need to do the ritual where the ghost has taken up residence. He’s floating around town freely right now—”
“And hitching rides in people,” Jon said bitterly.
“Right. That too. But his manifestation is centered in the Town Hall. I’ve felt him there any number of times. I think Helen has felt it, too. She’s been spending a lot of time there lately, and she’s been acting strange. I’ve heard her talking to people in her office and when I go in there’s no one there. She kept saying it was a phone call, and I believed her because I wanted to. I didn’t put it together until now but I think the Pilgrim Ghost has been talking to her. Influencing her somehow.”
“Possessing her,” Jon summarized. “We saw her at lunch yesterday. The ghost was in her just like it was in you.”
“Darcy…” Grace started to say, then stopped.
It was easy for Darcy to read her sister’s thoughts whether she spoke them out loud or not. They were written all over her face. “It’s all right, Grace. Yes, I know what that means. Helen and I both have been possessed by Nathaniel Williams. Either of us could be the actual killer. I don’t like how that adds up, but there it is.”
“No,” Jon said emphatically. “There’s no way you did that. The preliminary autopsy showed that each knife stroke was made with a lot of force. Not only do I not believe you’re capable of killing anyone, possessed or not, but I’m not sure you’d have the strength to do this.”
