Valley of the Shadow

by Pawlik, Tom

  With that, Conner excused himself and went out to his car, followed closely by Owen Bristol.

  Conner opened the door to his Mercedes as Owen leaned against the front fender.

  Conner rolled his eyes and sighed. “Look, Owen, I’m leaving, okay? You don’t need to—”

  “Listen up, guy,” Owen growled. “There’s a lot of creeps like you out there, trying to scam little old ladies out of their life savings. I suppose you think that just because we live out here in the country maybe we’re stupid or something. But I can—”

  Conner held up a hand. “Owen, I’m not trying to scam your moth—”

  “But I can guarantee you something.” Owen straightened up, his expression dark. “If you ever come back here trying to pull something like that again, they won’t ever find you.”

  “Is that a threat?” Conner tried to sound gruff, but his voice cracked and it just came out sounding pathetic.

  Owen snorted and leaned in close. “I mean, they’ll search for you… but they won’t ever find you. Are we clear on that… Felix?”

  51

  “THEY FOUND US,” Nathan said.

  In the darkened shadows of the lobby, Mitch saw movement. A black shape passed between two columns that framed the main entrances. Then another, off to the left.

  Mitch’s breath came in choppy rasps as he watched several dark figures approach the circle. He could see their black shapes now, grotesquely thin, crouching low and moving slowly—as if with caution. Then against the darkness, Mitch could see white eyes glowing.

  They stood around the entire perimeter of light, sniffing it. Inspecting it. Their mouths gaped open in low growls. They pressed close to the circle but did not cross it.

  “Don’t worry, Mitch; they won’t cross the line,” Nathan whispered, his voice barely audible above the hisses and growls. “Their hate for you is tempered only by their instinct for self-preservation.”

  “Will it kill them?”

  Nathan managed a grim chuckle. “No. Death doesn’t have the same meaning to them as it does to us. There’s no finality for them. But there are things worse than dying. They would be… severely disrupted for some time before regaining any semblance of their current form.”

  “What are they… like, demons?”

  “Not exactly. They’re the multiplied manifestation of the being that inhabits this dimension. They’re its collective mind and will.”

  “What being?”

  “Death,” Nathan said. “Death itself ushers lost and dying souls through this dimension to the other side. And it has only one overriding desire: to consume. It’s an endless hunger that feeds on all life. It’s savage and insatiable, even though there’s a steady stream of human souls to feed from.”

  “What about all the hallucinations? all the weird stuff I’ve seen?”

  Nathan shrugged. “Some of it people create themselves. Some of it Death creates just to generate terror. To heighten the experience.”

  Mitch couldn’t take his eyes off the creatures. “But me and Howard—these things never bothered us much. Not on the farm.”

  “Because he wanted to keep you here. Keep you from leaving. He tried to make you feel safe and lull you to sleep so you wouldn’t begin to get curious and venture off.”

  “Why would Howard be working with these things? What’s in it for him?”

  “Nothing.” Nathan shook his head. “I assume he made some kind of deal. Maybe to be set free and returned to his body. I don’t know. Whatever it is, I can guarantee you, Death has absolutely no intention of keeping up his end of the bargain.”

  Mitch closed his eyes and tried to block the sounds and even the thought of the Reapers from his mind. He could feel their presence just a few yards away.

  And then he heard something else.

  “Mitch!”

  Mitch’s eyes snapped open. He turned to see someone walking toward him from the darkness.

  52

  CONNER BACKED OUT of the driveway as Owen stood by, watching him. Conner put the car in gear and tore off down the highway. He wasn’t sure where he was going exactly, but he wanted to put some distance between him and that farm.

  His jaw was clenched so tight that his teeth hurt, and he cursed himself for being so stupid. Every instinct had screamed at him not to go with Mrs. Bristol to the farm. He should have just explained everything to her there in the nursing home. His heart was still pounding. And that crazed-looking monster of a son could have killed Conner with his bare hands.

  Conner glanced at his watch. It was nearly two o’clock. He drove a few miles farther and finally pulled onto the shoulder to collect his thoughts.

  His forehead was damp with a cold sweat. Owen had made a clear threat to him. He could kill Conner and dispose of his body where no one would ever find him. Conner glanced at his cell phone, still off. But there was no sense calling the police. From their perspective, Conner would have been in the wrong, looking as if he’d tried to take advantage of an old woman. Her son would have been justified in threatening him in that case.

  He leaned his head back and tried to clear his mind. Let his adrenaline level subside. He closed his eyes and tried to pray. But his thoughts were too jumbled and conflicted. Why was he even here? This whole trip had been a result of a dream. Just a stupid dream. And now he’d made a fool out of himself again.

  More than that, he’d been dishonest with Marta and Rachel. He’d left without explaining where he was going. At the time, he’d rationalized it away as being for their own protection. But protection from what? Conner had been feeling that he was up against some sort of ethereal menace. An enemy not of flesh and blood. Really just a general impression of danger. Or that someone he knew was in danger.

  But in the end, that was all he’d had to go on. He’d come all this way based on nothing more than a feeling.

  He started the car and pulled back onto the road. He’d had enough excitement for one day. For an entire month. And it was high time for him to go home and start to focus on his own family.

  He pulled into an old gas station to fill up. The station was so old the pumps weren’t even outfitted for credit card payment, so Conner had to pay inside when he was done. He stood at the counter while the gray-haired man swiped his card through the reader.

  The old man was leathery and grizzled with white hair and glasses perched at the edge of his nose. The reader had apparently not scanned Conner’s card properly, so he began tapping the card number into the keypad with a gnarled finger. Conner chuckled to himself.

  The old man grunted. “Forty-seven years and I still can’t get no one to work for me on Saturdays.”

  Tap, tap.

  “Forty-seven years, huh?” Conner frowned as a thought struck him. “So… you must know the Bristols up the road.”

  The old man looked up and his face crinkled as if Conner had just insulted his wife. “You a friend of theirs or something?”

  “Nope, I, uh…” Conner wasn’t sure exactly how to describe it. “No, I just met them actually.”

  The old man snorted and went back to his tapping, muttering to himself.

  Conner’s curiosity was piqued. “So you do know them.”

  “Not personally. I know of them,” he said finally. “Nobody round here really knows them all that well. The whole family’s a bit creepy, if you ask me. But that kid of theirs sure is a piece of work.”

  “Owen? Why? What’s he done?”

  The old man shook his head. “Oh, he’s just…” His voice trailed off and he sucked in a wheezing breath.

  “What?”

  “Just a bad seed.”

  Conner slipped his credit card back into his wallet. “You know, now that you mention it, he did seem a little odd.”

  “Odd?” The old man inspected Conner through narrowed eyes. “My wife used to teach sixth grade years back and had that boy in her class. She used to say he was like a grown man inside a child’s body. And not because he was smart. Because he was mean. N
ot little kid mean. Grown-up mean. Things he’d say to other kids. He never had any friends. And nobody who ever spent more’n five minutes with him ever wondered why.”

  He leaned forward and lowered his voice. “Once they caught him in the field out back of the school. He’d killed a cat and her litter of kittens. Choked ’em all. Said he’d done it just to see what it felt like.” He shook his head and snorted. “Like some kinda dang experiment. I mean, what kid does something like ’at?”

  Conner frowned. None of this information surprised him. If Owen was killing cats as a kid, what kind of things had he gotten into as an adult? “Has he ever been in trouble with the law?”

  “Well, he never did anything anyone could prove. Couple years back, though, we had a young guy from town just up and disappear.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean he disappeared. Dale Edwards. Couple years ago he left for work in the morning but never showed. A few days later, they found his car up near Gary, like it’d run outta gas. They looked all around up there, but no sign of Dale. Nowhere. Folks said he’d run off with some woman. But no one’s seen him since.”

  “So you think Owen killed him?”

  The old man just raised an eyebrow and shrugged.

  Conner went on. “Well, did they know each other?”

  “I think they went to school together.”

  “But I mean, did they have an argument or something? Was there any kind of motive?”

  “Motive?”

  “Yeah. Usually for a murder, there’s some reason for it. Some kind of motive.”

  “Beats me,” the old man snorted again. “He didn’t need no motive to kill them cats.”

  “Yeah, but you can’t just arrest somebody because they’re creepy. You need to establish motive, opportunity, and intent. And without a body, there’s no evidence that a murder even took…”

  Conner’s voice trailed off as he recalled his encounter with the Bristols. A chill washed down his back. Owen had made no uncertain threat to Conner’s life if he ever showed up there again.

  “They’ll never find you.”

  Owen definitely seemed ruthless enough—perhaps capable of such an act. After a moment, Conner shook his head and forced a chuckle. “Well, I guess I’m glad I made it out of there alive, then.”

  He returned to his car and turned on his cell phone. Three messages. He quickly dialed his voice mail and listened. The first was from Nancy at the office. She must’ve called yesterday after he’d left.

  “I saw you left early today. Just wanted to see if everything was okay. Call me if you need anything, Connie. Okay? I mean it.”

  The second message was from Marta earlier that morning. “Connie, call me when you get this please. I think it’s important.”

  The third was also from Marta at around noon. “Connie, why do you have your phone off? Call me as soon as you can. I got a call from a Jim Malone. He says he knows you. He said he needs to talk to you. Right away.”

  53

  MITCH STOOD AND WATCHED his father elbow his way through the crowd of Reapers to stand, hands on his hips, at the edge of the circle.

  “Dude,” Mitch whispered to Nathan, “do you see this too?”

  “I see him.”

  “He’s . . . he’s real then, right? Or is this another hallucination?”

  “He’s probably a manifestation of your thoughts and memories. Were you thinking about him just now?”

  “No. At least I’ve been trying not to.”

  Nathan stood. “Then I would say they’re trying to deceive you again. They obviously know the issues you had with him and they’re trying to use that against you.”

  “But how? I’m not going out there.”

  “I’m not sure what they’re trying to do. Just try to ignore him for now.”

  “Yeah.” Mitch rolled his eyes. “Like that’s gonna happen.”

  Mitch was turning to sit down when his father bellowed, “Don’t you turn your back on me!”

  “Whatever.” Mitch put his feet up on the coffee table.

  “I’m not paying for your school so you can goof off.”

  “Yeah, I know.”

  Nathan sat down again, across from Mitch, his forehead puckered. “Just don’t respond.”

  “And that,” his father went on, “that right there is the problem. The kind of friends you’re hanging around with. They’re the ones getting you into trouble all the time.”

  Mitch sighed. Nathan motioned him to ignore the comment, but he couldn’t not respond. His anger was growing. The man was always dictating. Always setting some new rules to obey. And not for Mitch’s good. Not out of love. These rules were designed solely to keep Mitch from embarrassing him. To keep the congressman’s son out of trouble. And out of the news.

  “They’re like bad pennies, Dad. They just keep showing up wherever you send me.”

  “Well, not while you’re under my roof. Not while I’m paying the bills.”

  Mitch popped up off the couch again and turned to face his father. Somewhere in the back of his head, Mitch knew this wasn’t his father, but he couldn’t help himself. He was angry and he was going to vent. All the rage that had been pent up for so many years was starting to explode out of him in short bursts. Rage over the man’s political obsessions, with getting reelected every two years, with his career and his reputation. And rage over the loss of the only good thing in their family.

  His mother had been the glue that had kept them together. And she had been the insulation that kept them apart. She maintained an uneasy peace and was always trying to reconcile her husband and son.

  But now that she was gone, it was metal on metal. There was no more buffer. No quiet voice of calm and reason. No faithful partner and no hope for peace. Her death had driven them farther apart than Mitch could have imagined. His father had not let the news of Mitch’s role in her death leak out. He’d not told a soul. But not for Mitch’s sake. Rather for his own reputation. Mitch was sure the old man would’ve gone public with the story if it could have bolstered his career in some way.

  Indeed, his mother’s illness had already garnered an outpouring of public sympathy. It was just the thing his father had needed in a close race that year. Mitch had watched his father make her illness a central focus in his campaign by steadfastly maintaining in every speech that he would not use her illness for political purposes.

  Mitch’s jaw clenched. He stood nose-to-nose with his father. The blue veil of light was all that separated them.

  “You’re paying the bills?” Mitch sneered. “You’re paying the bills? You’re a politician, Dad. Remember? You live off the public dole like a leech. Bloodsucking the taxpayers and getting kickbacks on the side!”

  “Mitch, stop!” Nathan’s voice sounded too late.

  Mitch reached through the light and grabbed for his father’s throat, but his fingers closed on empty air. His father’s image had dissolved into nothing.

  Mitch pulled his hand back through. The Reapers hissed and growled, baring their teeth and puffing out their chests. But then—as if by some unseen or inaudible cue—they began to back away from the light. On every side, they moved back into the shadows and disappeared.

  Nathan stood beside him as they peered into the darkness. Outside, the faint trace of gray morning light began to filter through the front double doors.

  “Is that why they left?” Mitch whispered. “Daylight?”

  Nathan shrugged. “I . . . I don’t know.”

  They stood in silence for several more seconds.

  The circle of light crackled a bit, flickered, and then began to fade.

  Mitch heaved a deep sigh. “Well, wherever they went, let’s hope they stay—”

  He never finished. The building shook with a deafening noise from outside. A thundering roar that Mitch recognized immediately. The ground trembled as a massive shadow passed by the window.

  54

  CONNER DIALED MARTA’S CELL while still parked at th
e gas station. He hoped he wasn’t too late to get ahold of Jim Malone. Maybe it hadn’t been a coincidence that they’d run into each other at the juvie center the day before.

  “Connie? I’ve been trying to call you all day.”

  “I’m sorry, sweetheart. It’s kind of a long story, but I left my cell phone off. I felt like I had to come down here and see Howard for myself.”

  “Howard Bristol?” Marta’s voice seemed to go up an octave. “Why didn’t you tell me? I would have come with you.”

  “That’s why I didn’t tell you. Look, I just felt like I had to do this myself.”

  “Why? That doesn’t make any sense.”

  “I know it doesn’t, and I can’t really explain it, either. Besides you and Rachel had plans today and I didn’t want to derail everything you had going on.”

  “I’m your wife, Connie. I’m supposed to be helping you, but how can I do that if you keep shutting me out?”

  Conner rubbed his eyes. “Marty, I’m not shutting you out. I just had to see him and I didn’t want to drag you all the way down here for that.”

  There was a pause on the other end. “So did you see him?”

  “Yeah. He was in a nursing home, still in a coma. Completely unresponsive.”

  “Are you on your way back, then?”

  Conner hesitated. He didn’t want to go into all the details of his visit with Mrs. Bristol and Owen. Frankly, he wasn’t sure what he was going to do. He wasn’t quite ready to leave. He felt like he was following a trail of bread crumbs now that was leading him somewhere. And he couldn’t give up.

  “Soon. I want to check one last thing first and then I’ll head back.”

  He could hear Marta sigh on the other end. “Well, I got the strangest phone call this morning.”

  “From Jim Malone?”

  “He said he was a client of yours.”

  “Almost a client. Actually, I just ran into him yesterday morning.” Conner winced. He hadn’t told Marta about going to see Devon. Not that it was a big deal. She knew he’d been trying to track the kid down for the last several weeks. But after the whole Pastor Lewis fiasco, this wouldn’t go over well. He’d look like he was trying to keep more secrets.