Hope's End

by Mark Lukens

  “What do you want?” Jed asked, aiming his Colt right at Red Moon. Jed’s arm shook so badly he wasn’t sure he would be able to put a bullet into Red Moon even if he wanted to.

  Red Moon didn’t answer.

  A coyote called out in the inky-black distance, then another coyote answered the first one’s call.

  Red Moon reached his left hand out towards Billy who slept on his blanket five feet away. Red Moon reached his right hand towards Sanchez. Red Moon’s arms were growing impossibly long, his fingers stretching to touch each man. Bones popped away from the joints inside of Red Moon’s arms as they grew longer, muscles and skin stretching and threatening to snap.

  Jed pulled the trigger and . . .

  . . . he jumped awake.

  It was almost dawn, the eastern sky on fire with the first rays of the morning sun. Jed sat up and looked around, his hand on his gun. The campfire was out, just a pile of ash and partially burned sticks of wood now with a weak tendril of smoke rising up.

  A hand touched Jed’s arm and he whirled around.

  It was David.

  Jed stared at the boy, his vision blurring as tears filled his eyes. “David . . .”

  “I am safe,” David said. “I am warm and safe now.” David smiled at him.

  Jed went to reach for David and then . . .

  . . . he woke up. He sat up and stared at the campfire. It was out just like it had been in the dream.

  A hand touched Jed’s arm. He turned, expecting to see David, but he saw Esmerelda instead.

  “It’s over,” Esmerelda told him. “It’s really over.”

  He stared at her for a long moment.

  She scooted closer to him and hugged him. She held him for a while, and he held her. It had been a long time since he’d held a woman like this.

  “I had a dream,” he whispered into her hair.

  She nodded.

  “I had a nightmare, but then I saw David.”

  “I know,” she said. And that’s all she needed to say. Jed was sure that she had seen David in her dreams, too.

  *

  An hour and a half later, after they had eaten a quick breakfast and broke camp, they were ready to begin their long walk.

  Sanchez left them first, walking south towards Mexico. He would have the longest journey of them all. Jed figured Sanchez would buy a horse with all of the money he seemed to have. Whether he rode to Mexico or walked there, Jed was sure that he would reach his destination. Sanchez was a fighter. He was a survivor. Any obstacles he faced along his journey now would be nothing compared to what he had already seen in Hope’s End.

  Billy headed east. There were few words between the three of them when they parted, and soon they had nothing left to say to each other. Jed thanked him.

  Before Billy turned to walk away, he stared at Jed for a moment. “David is not dead,” he told him.

  Jed didn’t respond.

  “He is in a different place now,” Billy added. “He lives there now.”

  Jed nodded like he already knew that. And he swore he did. He had a feeling that Billy knew he had seen David in a dream—Billy knew things like Esmerelda knew things. He shook Billy’s hand and then watched him walk away.

  Jed and Esmerelda headed north to Smith Junction. Unless they could borrow a horse along the way, their walk was going to be a long one—at least three days and two nights of camping. But Esmerelda was strong, and she never complained once.

  “Billy’s right,” Esmerelda said six hours later when they stopped by a large grouping of rocks that Billy had told them about, a place where they would find pools of water in the rocks to refill their canteens.

  Jed didn’t answer Esmerelda as he sipped water from his canteen.

  “David’s not dead,” she said. “I can feel him.”

  Jed just nodded at her. He believed her.

  Later that night, as they camped, Jed asked Esmerelda what her plans were.

  “I’ve been saving my money for years now to get to California,” she said, and then she was quiet for a moment. “I’ve had enough money to leave for a while now. I don’t know why I was putting it off for so long.”

  Jed wondered if that was true. Maybe Esmerelda knew why she had put her journey off. Maybe deep down inside she knew that she needed to be in Hope’s End—she needed to be there to help David when the Ancient Enemy showed up.

  “What about you?” she asked.

  He shrugged. “Don’t really know. I don’t want to be a marshal anymore. I’m no good as a rancher or a farmer. I should just sell my place to Chavez.”

  Esmerelda moved closer to Jed, snuggling up to him. “Go with me. We could go to California. Travel up to San Francisco. Maybe even farther north.”

  Jed was quiet for a moment. And then he looked at her and smiled. “Yeah. Maybe we could.”

  Esmerelda kissed Jed . . . a long, slow kiss. She backed away and stared at him. And then she kissed him again.

  Jed felt better now than he had a long time. He wasn’t afraid now, and he wasn’t lonely anymore. For the first time in years he felt hope.

  CHAPTER 39

  New Mexico—2018

  David snapped awake in bed. For just a second he wasn’t sure where he was, but then he knew he was in his Aunt Awenita’s house, where he had lived the last seven years. It had been seven years since he had battled the Ancient Enemy in the ghost town that had once been the small town of Hope’s End so long ago. It had been seven years since he had traveled through Colorado, New Mexico, and then into Arizona with Stella and Cole. It had been seven years since he had first met Joe Blackhorn.

  He sat up and swung his legs over the edge of his bed, breathing out a long sigh. He was about to turn on the lamp next to his bed, but he didn’t. A shaft of moonlight shined in through the window and provided just enough light for him to see.

  He’d been dreaming, but it was more than that. Those weren’t dreams; they were memories . . . memories of Jed and Esmerelda, of Sanchez and Billy. Those memories were as real to him as the memories of Stella and Cole.

  And the memories of the Ancient Enemy.

  David felt like two people right now. It felt like one life had ended and a split second later he was here in this life. Yet when he slept, he was back in one of his old lives. Each time he woke up in a new life, the Ancient Enemy followed him.

  But not this time. No, this time the Ancient Enemy had been defeated in that ghost town.

  Hadn’t it?

  David took a sip from a bottle of water beside his lamp on the table next to his bed. He grabbed his cell phone and lay back down. He scrolled to an internet article he had come across a few days ago, one he had saved.

  The memories of his dream came flooding back as he stared at his phone. He remembered every one of them now: Jed, Esmerelda, Billy, and Sanchez. He remembered Moody holding a knife to his throat. He remembered his mother and father and his brother; he remembered what had happened to them in that house. He remembered the saloon and the church. He remembered Hope’s End when it was still a town, and not the ghost town it was now.

  And there were other memories, ones that went further back into the past. How far back? How many lives?

  He couldn’t think about that. When he woke up from these dreams, he had to think about something else or it would drive him crazy.

  He looked at the internet article he had saved on his phone. He’d been looking up any articles or news he could find about Costa Rica for a few years now. Mostly the articles were about tourism or local stories, but a few days ago he’d come across a frightening article about a village where everyone had been slaughtered. The people in the village had been mutilated beyond belief, a savagery so brutal it was almost unimaginable.

  The news article made him think of Billy Nez, the Navajo he’d known in another life. He remembered Billy telling them that there were other Ancient Enemies in other places. He also thought of Sanchez and the story he had told about an Ancient Enemy in the south among the May
a and Inca people, and the mass disappearances that had happened there in the past.

  David read the news article again. The local authorities were blaming the massacre on a drug cartel, but David couldn’t help thinking that it was something worse. He couldn’t help thinking about how close Stella and Cole were to that village. Stella had stayed in contact with him through the years. They had exchanged letters and texts, even talked to each other on Skype a few times. Stella and Cole were doing well, and David was happy about that. She and Cole were living down there under different names, and she was back to doing what she loved again, archaeology. She was working with a university down there on a dig site.

  But even though she seemed happy, David always saw just the hint of fear in her eyes when he talked with her through the computer. She tried to hide it, but he could see it. He told himself that she was just traumatized—like he had been and still was—but it was more than that, it was like she was waiting for all of it to start again, for the Ancient Enemy to find them again.

  And now, after reading the article about the slaughter in the village thirty miles away from where Stella and Cole lived, David couldn’t help thinking that they might be in danger.

  David stared up at the ceiling in the darkness, wondering what he should do. Should he text her? Warn her? But what if it wasn’t the Ancient Enemy? What if it really was some drug cartel? Or a madman, some crazy serial killer? David had seen a killer in his dreams, a man who seemed like a living shadow, a man who prowled the darkness and killed, a man who couldn’t be caught by the police.

  He sat up with his phone, Stella’s contact page already on the screen. His finger hovered over the keyboard, ready to type a message.

  CHAPTER 40

  “Get up!” Stella yelled at Cole, pulling the bedsheet off of the bed.

  Cole sat bolt-upright in bed. Stella had the overhead light on and their two battered suitcases sat on the tiled floor near the doorway. He had no idea what time it was. It was still dark outside, and it felt like he’d only been asleep for a few minutes. But when he looked at the alarm clock he saw that it was almost dawn.

  Stella was dressed in jeans and a button down shirt, the sleeves rolled up. Her blond hair was tied back into a tight ponytail and she had her hiking boots on. Her eyes were wide with fear, her tanned skin paler than he’d seen it in years. He hadn’t seen her this frightened since . . .

  Cole jumped out of bed, wearing only a pair of underwear. He grabbed his clothes from the chair. It was hot in the bedroom, the ceiling fan barely pushing the heat away. They didn’t have any air conditioning in this house, but usually the ocean breeze was enough to cool them off. But even though it was hot, Cole felt cold. A chill danced across his skin, raising goose pimples. He felt like he was back in Colorado again, back in that freezing cold with something dangerous and unimaginable waiting outside, something approaching their front porch, something about to knock on their front door and ask for things.

  He was dressed in a few seconds, slipping his feet into a pair of boots, buckling the belt on his jeans, pulling a T-shirt over his head. He shoved his gun down into the waistband of his pants, making sure he had an extra magazine with him.

  Stella was somewhere else in the house. It sounded like she was throwing a few of their possessions into a cardboard box, taking only the bare necessities with them. And Cole knew what those necessities were. They had talked about being prepared many times during the seven years they had lived down here in Costa Rica. They had talked about keeping two suitcases ready in case they needed to leave suddenly. They had talked about the preparations they needed to make, the weapons they needed to have, the traps they needed to set. And now it was time to act.

  Cole darted towards the door where their suitcases waited, and Stella was hurrying down the hall to him. She was still scared, running around with nervous energy buzzing through her. She stopped when she saw him in the doorway.

  She didn’t need to say the words because Cole already knew, but she said them anyway: “It’s happening again.”

  AUTHOR’S NOTE:

  Thank you so much for buying and reading my book. I hope you enjoyed it. I’m in the process of writing the next book in the series—the final book and the final showdown. There will be some familiar faces in the new book, and some new ones, some surprises and twists. I hope you’ll look for it when it’s available.

  Being an author is a dream come true for me, and it only happens because of readers like you. I thank you from the bottom of my heart.

  Please feel free to follow my blog for updates, sales, articles, and more. Just click on the link below and select the Follow button.

  www.marklukensbooks.wordpress.com

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

  Mark Lukens has been writing since the second grade when his teacher called his parents in for a conference because the ghost story he’d written had her a little concerned.

  Since then he’s had several stories published and four screenplays optioned by producers in Hollywood. One script is in development to become a film. He’s the author of many bestselling books including: Ancient Enemy, Sightings, The Exorcist’s Apprentice, Devil’s Island, Followed, and many others. He’s a proud member of the Horror Writers Association.

  He grew up in Daytona Beach, Florida. But after many travels and adventures, he settled down near Tampa, Florida with his wonderful wife and son . . . and a stray cat they adopted.

  He loves to hear from readers!

  You can find him on Facebook here:

  https://www.facebook.com/Mark-Lukens-Books-670337796318510/

  You can follow him on Twitter @marklukensbooks

  His blog is: www.marklukensbooks.wordpress.com

  He can be reached via email at mark@marklukensbooks.com and marklukensbooks@yahoo.com

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