Lacey looked ahead. Aaron and Laz were standing on the front porch. But they weren’t looking at her. No, they were watching two other figures, the figures that Lacey had seen moments ago when she first spotted Jared on the road, receding into the distance and out of the range of her headlights.
Collete and his boy, Robbie.
“Oh, good Lord.”
Lacey abruptly stopped the car after accelerating the final forty yards to the Kinney house, and Jared jumped out despite his exhaustion. He ran toward the two Collete figures, now nearly out of sight. Lacey ran from the driver’s side and planted herself firmly in front of him. Jared halted momentarily to grab her shoulders and politely but firmly push her aside. She held onto his forearms in the process, and would have lost her grip if Aaron hadn’t run up behind her deputy and placed him in a bear hug.
“Let me go. They’re getting away.”
“Son, you stop now. There’s nothing you can do.” Aaron grunted the words while squeezing hard.
Jared yelled incoherently as he attempted to shake off the older man. His efforts only resulted in the two of them falling over, with Jared on the bottom.
“Jared, you calm down,” Lacey yelled, irritated with her old-lady delivery.
“Damn, boy, listen to the sheriff. You can’t go there. You’re not welcome.”
Aaron still had Jared in his bear hug, but his arms were pinned beneath the deputy. As Jared squirmed, Aaron’s arms and the back of his hands were grinding into grit, pebbles, and jagged stones. It had to hurt.
“Hey, Jared.”
With a suddenness that amazed Lacey, Jared ceased thrashing. The only sounds were gasping breaths from Aaron and Jared, and her own, she realized. Jared tilted his head toward the speaker, his face pale even in the artificial glare of headlights. Some drool joined the perspiration and blood on his face. He looked deranged.
Only Laz seemed calm. “Hey, Jared,” he repeated.
Jared sighed. “Laz, what?” His voice was raspy from exertion, but his tension was evaporating.
Laz reached out and touched his sweaty head—it was almost a caress. “You can’t go. No. No. That’s not for you. You can’t.”
Jared groaned. Maybe it was even a sob.
“Aaron, I think you can let him go.”
“Yeah, Daddy, you can. Jared ain’t going nowhere. He knows.”
This time it was Aaron’s turn to groan as he shifted his body off the deputy. He grimaced as he slid his arms out from under Jared. Lacey frowned in sympathy at the gashes and lengthy scratches on his arms.
Jared gradually sat up, looking defeated. “Fuck.”
Had Jared ever sworn in front of Lacey before? Stupid thought. Before she could comment and assume some control of the situation, Laz spoke again.
“Mrs. Nelson and me will go make sure they get to the right place.”
Lacey was nonplussed momentarily. She looked at Aaron. “Do you know what this is about?”
She was stunned when he nodded.
By this time, Laz had already grabbed Jared under his arms and lifted him to his feet. Jared complied easily; his lack of resistance suggested exhaustion. Laz placed one of the deputy’s arms over his shoulder and escorted him toward the front porch and the comfort of the Kinney living room beyond the screen door.
Lacey and Aaron walked behind them a few paces. “You have some explaining to do, I think.”
“It’s a long story.”
“I’m not going anywhere.” Lacey stopped and crossed her arms.
“Laz says you are. I believe him. He can explain it. I’ll take care of your young man.”
Emergency lights accelerated toward them.
That would be Daphne. Thank God she didn’t have the siren blaring. Her head was starting to ache.
5
LAZ
LACEY HAD GOTTEN TO KNOW Laz right before she retired from teaching to take care of Martin. Along with Jared and Daphne, he was in that last cohort of kids that she taught.
Laz had been diagnosed with mild autism sometime in elementary school, and while he was able to function in regular classes with some help, he was an odd-duck sort of kid. His verbal interactions were awkward at best; sometimes he spoke with a forced, almost irritated tone and little inflection, while other times his words had a singsong quality. Though he could give eye contact, extended efforts at it were tough, and he scanned the ground or the horizon over your shoulder if the conversation extended more than thirty seconds. His stance was also out of the ordinary—he’d rock from one foot to the other as if he were swaying to an internal beat only he could hear.
Middle school should’ve been deadly for Laz. Savage tendencies took over in that age group, the maneuverings for dominance were often brutal, and bullying for bragging rights was common. But Laz possessed a trait that saved him from cruelty.
Laz was the diviner of the class. Their fortune-teller. When peers lost homework or personal items, or sought guidance on some future event, Laz was the go-to expert.
“Ah shit, Laz. I can’t find my book. Where’d I put it?”
Laz touched the other kid on the shoulder. “On your dining table at home.”
“Laz, I can’t find my money.”
Shoulder touch. “It’s in your gym bag.”
“Do you think Amber likes me, Laz?”
Shoulder touch and a smile. “Yeah, she does. She wants you to talk to her.”
Lacey estimated that his hit rate was less than fifty percent. But when he didn’t see the answer, he’d say so. He never gave wrong information.
One day a class guinea pig went missing. Lacey could still see the stupid thing, with its white face and tan body. Pat Hutchison, the teacher whose classroom housed it, came to Lacey’s room right before class started.
“Rodney’s escaped. I can’t find him.” Pat glanced at Laz. “Shall we…?”
“Sure, why not.”
The classroom sensed something was going on, and all of the kids quieted down to listen.
“Hi, Laz. I was wondering if you can help me.” Pat’s voice was pleasant and matter-of-fact.
Laz gazed in her direction. He didn’t know her well and was therefore less trusting. “Maybe.”
“Okay, here it is. Rodney’s gone missing from his cage. I’ve looked all over the place. Can you help?”
The other kids perked up with interest. A missing-animal case!
“Okay.”
Laz rose unceremoniously and left the classroom. As one, the rest of the class popped from their seats and followed, whispering excitedly. Lacey was about to call them back, but held off.
Pat’s classroom was next door. When Lacey’s class marched in behind Laz and joined Pat’s students, the number of kids nearly doubled. They swarmed around the cage, and Pat gently forced her way through the crowd, muttering instructions to the group. Her typically relaxed demeanor kept the large group under control. They were mesmerized by the chance to observe a genuine paranormal act.
Laz stood perfectly still for a few moments in front of the empty cage. From the rear of the group, Lacey saw his shoulder blades twitch ever so slightly under his T-shirt. His slender frame was like a sapling, scrawny but sturdy. Lacey noted with amusement that the cage was called a hamster habitat and contained an exercise wheel, a look-out deck and ladder, a water bottle, and other assorted doodads. There were wood shavings and even a cardboard toilet paper roll.
The tiniest gasp of anticipation escaped from the surrounding kids as Laz raised his hand to touch the open door of Rodney’s cage. He delicately ran the tip of his index finger over the bars. Next he extended his arms to touch seemingly random objects inside. The wheel, a few shavings, and the stairs to the deck all received a brush with his fingers. Laz finally removed his hand and stood silently with his head bowed. The group remained utterly still. Lacey had never seen nearly thirty middle school kids be so completely quiet.
Laz turned to look briefly at Pat and then shifted his gaze to Lacey. He spoke to her,
his eyes dark like an overcast day.
“Rodney’s dead,” he said faintly. There were sighs from the group. “I don’t know how. Or where. He was cold, and wet. He couldn’t breathe and he couldn’t see…”
With that, Laz walked through the group of students, who separated into two respectful groups to create a path. One of the boys said, “Well, that sucks.”
Lacey nodded to Pat and herded her students back to the classroom. Some of the kids pumped Laz for additional details, but he shrugged and offered nothing more. The group was clearly disappointed.
Seven hours later and barely ten minutes before dismissal, a piercing scream shattered the hallway followed by another voice yelling, “Holy shit.”
“Remain in your seats,” Lacey called to her class as she sprinted toward the door. She was greeted by Pat exiting her classroom and two of Pat’s students, a boy and a girl, stumbling from the janitor’s closet. The girl was red-faced and teary. The boy’s expression was a mixture of terror and excitement. He pointed back to the closet. Lacey cautiously moved inside, and Pat was close behind. The boy followed, but the girl ran back to the classroom.
An industrial-sized pail sat on the floor alongside a string mop. The pail was filled halfway with grimy water colored to a lifeless grayish brown. Floating in the water was something furry. Somehow, Rodney had found his way into the room, got into the pail, and couldn’t get out.
A cold, wet, suffocating death, indeed.
Now, ten years later, Lacey rode in her car with Laz in the passenger seat. They were chasing two figures who’d passed by a short time ago. A man and his son. Both unmistakably dead. Yet here she was.
Lacey glanced at the young man to her right. He was staring intently ahead. The dashboard illumination cast a faint ice-blue glow on his face. The contours of his features produced shadows that fused with the darkness behind his head. The result was eerie; his eyes and nose seemed to float effortlessly in the air, unattached to anything. There were no oncoming headlights to disrupt the illusion.
“Laz, your father said you could explain everything to me.” The headlights of the patrol car weren’t picking up the walking figures, and she wondered—hoped, maybe—that what she’d seen was a hallucination. Laz turned toward her. He looked confused.
The question was too abstract. Tighten the boundaries.
“Darrin Collete and Robbie are dead. I saw their bodies. What do you know about them walking out here?”
Several seconds passed and Laz didn’t move a muscle. He kept staring at Lacey. She was preparing to ask the question in yet another way when he answered.
“I need to shut the gate.” Laz shifted to return his gaze to the world outside the windshield. He appeared tightly coiled and ready to leap at the slightest notice. Lacey hoped he would let her stop the car before he tried to jump out.
“What does that mean?”
“Do you remember the old cabin? We found it after Jared was missing?”
How could she forget? “Yes. What has that got to do with anything?”
“That’s where we have to go. It’s a gate. We need to make sure it closes.”
This was going nowhere. Lacey considered her options.
“Stop here!” Laz yelled so loud that the car swerved with Lacey’s startled reaction. She grabbed the wheel and applied the brakes. Just as she suspected, Laz was jumping out of the car.
“Laz, you wait for me. I mean it.” She applied her angriest teacher voice out of pure instinct and she was stunned to see him halt midstep.
“Hold on this instant, mister.” She would keep up the mean-teacher routine as long as it worked. “Are we going through the woods to that cabin?”
“Yes, ma’am.” Laz was fidgeting and ready to pounce like a bloodhound through the forest.
“Well, we’re going to need some light.” She turned on a small LED flashlight, which was surprisingly effective in chasing the darkness into the surrounding shadows. Lacey moved quickly around the car and latched on to his elbow. Under normal circumstances, Laz wasn’t keen on people touching him. He tensed slightly but didn’t shake her off. “You need to tell me what this is, Laz.” She resumed her more natural tone. “Before we take another step.”
Laz actually stomped his left foot and growled. If they hadn’t been standing in the darkness chasing two ghosts, she would have laughed.
“Laz.”
“Alright. You didn’t see Collete and his little boy go down here?”
She hadn’t. Laz was pointing in the general direction of that rundown cabin beyond the woods.
“You saw them?”
“Yes. Once they go through the gate, I have to make sure it’s closed. Or the demons will be running free. If they do, they can make all kinds of trouble.”
What did you say to something like this? Lacey felt her jaw hang open. She shut it with an audible click.
“Lazarus, come out!”
Lacey almost fell to her knees. The voice came from beyond the trees. A childlike squeal with a gravely undertone, as if the speaker were recovering from a respiratory infection. The gleeful laugh that followed was pure evil, however, and suggested something vile.
“See?”
A shape, maybe the size a large dog or a deer, crashed through the forest beyond the illumination of the flashlight. Hideous giggles trailed the echoes of bushes that had been thrashed by the movement.
She looked at Laz and tried to form a question. He was rocking on his toes, eager to take off in pursuit.
“We need to move, or else we’re in a big mess.”
Lacey nodded.
Lacey held onto Laz’s elbow and tried to stop him from accelerating too quickly. She feared tripping over an exposed root or stray rock. He pulled her with surprising strength to the point where they were single file and Laz was running sideways, dragging her along. He gave abrupt commands: “Going right.” “Left.” “Branch, head down.” While she got through mostly unscathed, at least two stray branches slapped her face. One drew blood with an especially nasty twig that scraped her lip at just the right angle.
Laz began slowing at some cue that only he could see. Lacey had the sense that he had made this trip many times in the past and could traverse it blindfolded.
Laz held his hand up for quiet and Lacey obliged. The immediate area was illuminated by the flashlight she’d forgotten she was carrying. Not twenty yards away was the deserted cabin.
“If you’re dumb enough to kill a Chilton or a Grahame or anyone else who came from Kingdom families, the gate opens. Demons—they were people when they first came to the Kingdom all those years ago—come out to take them for a special kind of celebration.”
Laz scanned the clearing around the cabin. “Stupid fucks, everyone should know this by now.”
For the second time tonight, Lacey was temporarily taken aback by the language of a former student. She quickly disregarded the feeling; more important things were at stake.
“Laz, I need you to talk to me.”
He continued to scan the perimeter of what was visible from the flashlight. Then he pointed in the general direction they had come from.
“There. We beat them here. Just like I thought”
The pressure of the air became oppressive, almost as if it had liquefied. Lacey was tempted to move her arm to check whether bubbles would trail away from her skin. She could still breathe—she knew that—so resisted efforts to grasp the air. But some physical law of human existence had changed. What she was sensing wasn’t part of human experience. This was like time surging backwards or water flowing uphill. Only under those conditions did air change.
Or the dead walk the earth.
Not fifteen feet away from Lacey were Darrin and Robbie Collete. They glowed under the night sky. Robbie seemed to be pulling his father with a rope, although nothing like a rope was visible. They traversed a slightly beaten path barely visible in the pale light. But their destination was clear. Robbie was bringing his father to the rundown cabin.
“Ohhh…”
The moan practically crushed Lacey with its pain. Collete clearly knew he was helpless. Whatever was happening, there was nothing he could do to stop it.
The boy was another story. Robbie was triumphant. His smile radiated a perverse joy, much like the excitement displayed by a child upon entering an amusement park. His expression faltered ever so slightly when he noticed them, or maybe just Laz. Robbie recovered within moments, however, and resumed his celebratory expression.
“We have to be quick.”
Lacey was puzzled. Laz had spoken, but not to her. He was peering over her shoulder. Light flickered across Laz’s face. Was someone behind her carrying a torch? She turned slowly—but not before noticing an expression of panic from Robbie. The dead boy was now well behind Laz, but he dragged the sobbing Collete with renewed effort.
A gust of wind rustled the bushes and trees within her field of vision. Their shaking intensified to the extent that Lacey wondered whether another storm front was approaching. When she finally rotated enough to identify the source of light behind her, it was the last thing she’d expected.
Martin stood on the path. His feet were spread apart in an authoritative manner, and his sheriff’s hat tilted slightly to the back of his head. His gaze was warm, with a subdued smile. He’d often looked at Lacey like that when presenting a gift to her for her birthday or Christmas, especially when he wasn’t sure if she would like it.
Martin’s hands clasped the hilt of a long sword, the point of which rested on the dirt path. He might have been leaning on it slightly. His posture was robust and commanding, much like it had been before his devastating illness struck.
The sword itself was encased in flames. The flames shimmered with orange and blue. Lacey struggled to trust her perceptions. Martin’s hands should have been singed, and his uniform trouser legs should have been on fire.
The Torment Page 6
