by Brian Harmon
Eric gripped the shard of glass in his fist. “Not going to happen.”
“You don’t have any bargaining power,” Pink Shirt informed him. “You’re trapped down there. I’ve already won.”
His eyes darting through the darkness, Eric realized that he was right. Right now, he wasn’t taking the chance of collapsing the badly burned tunnel, but when he grew impatient, he’d find a way down here, even if it meant taking this school apart one brick at a time. They couldn’t escape. Somewhere in this room, he was sure there was a passage leading back to the boiler room. The aura plasma was almost certainly waiting for them there as well as back in the auditorium. It was only a matter of time before the glass shard was his.
It was looking grim.
“You’ll die down there,” Pink Shirt informed him.
“If that’s how it has to be…” dared Eric.
“Heroic. But that won’t help the little girl on the phone. When I tell my bosses about her, they’ll hunt her down and carve her up to see how she works. And they will find her, no matter where she goes.”
The thought was dreadful, but at the same time, he’d essentially just told them that he had not yet informed them of Isabelle’s existence. For the time being at least, she remained a secret.
“You’re not getting the shard,” insisted Eric. “I’ll destroy it first.”
Pink Shirt’s voice boomed in their ears, driving daggers of pain into their skulls, “You’ll do no such thing!”
Eric and Aiden cried out in agony. They clutched their ears and fell to their knees in the cold, black sludge that filled the chamber.
At the same instant, Eric felt something profoundly terrifying somewhere deep inside of him.
A powerful presence blossomed into awareness in the cold, grimy darkness.
The jinn was awake.
Chapter Forty-Four
Eric actually felt the creature’s eye open, as if the very motion of its strange lid disrupted the chamber’s black atmosphere. He felt himself observed, studied, measured.
A low, unearthly groan filled the room and that swampy stench suddenly became overwhelming, threatening to gag him.
Light blossomed from the unseen crack in the wall and brilliant orange flames fanned out across the blackened stone, illuminating the room for the first time and revealing the remains of melted pipes and wires strung across the concrete ceiling overhead.
Queer veins of flames snaked out over the filthy floor, surrounding Eric and Aiden as they rose cautiously to their feet and shielded their dark-adapted eyes.
Eric’s only thought was that the summoners were always slaughtered first…
“No!” shouted Pink Shirt. “Not now!”
Somewhere inside his head, Eric heard a strange, warbling noise. As it bubbled up through his thoughts, that noise took on a curious structure and became something that resembled a language, though not one Eric had ever heard before. Then it changed somehow, shifting slightly, becoming something different. Soon, this disturbing, alien voice seemed to be cycling through dead languages as if it were tuning a radio. Then, shockingly clear inside his own head, he heard three words in clear English: LET. ME. OUT.
Eric released the breath he didn’t realize he’d been holding in what he thought was going to be something like a scream, but what came out was a strange, breathless sound that might have been closer to a laugh.
What was going on?
Again, the voice filled his head. LET. ME. OUT.
“No!” cried Eric. He took a step back, his eyes fixed on the fire-spewing crack in the wall. “What are you?”
The response was stark and emotionless: NAMELESS…
“What’s going on?” demanded Pink Shirt. “Who are you talking to?”
“What’s happening?” asked Aiden.
LET. ME. OUT.
“I can’t,” replied Eric. “I wouldn’t even know how.”
SHOW. ME.
Eric cried out and clutched his head.
Aiden rushed to his side. “What’s wrong?”
Something was inside his head. It felt like a great, writhing ball of worms, burrowing through his brain, squirming in and out of his thoughts. It was the most awful feeling he’d ever known. He wanted it to end. He wanted to dash his head against the concrete wall until it split open and spilled the intruder from his screaming skull.
I SEE… said the strange, alien voice in his head.
Then a memory occurred to Eric, a memory that was not his own, that could not have been his own because it happened more than a century before he was even born.
He was standing in this room, but it was not black. It was not burned. The floor was not covered in reeking sludge. It was just a room. There were wooden work benches against the wall. There were tools hanging over them. There were tables and chairs.
This was a work room of some sort.
It was connected to the boiler room through one door and to the auditorium at the end of the tunnel. A combination maintenance room and shop for the theater. It was also a tornado shelter.
He understood these things clearly now. Just as he understood that he wasn’t supposed to be here now. It was late. The school was closed. He looked around and saw others standing around him.
They were all just kids. Teenagers. Students. The blonde girl next to him looked nervous.
They were going to try something tonight, something incredible.
Then he jumped forward and everything was ablaze.
He felt unrelenting pain and terror. He heard terrible screams.
Someone was writhing on the floor, their flesh burned black.
Then he was back in the present, crying out in terror.
They were just kids. How could they have done such a thing?
THEY WERE USED.
Eric realized this was true. Someone fed them the information, tricked them into performing the summoning. They were sacrificed. He knew these things as certainly as if he’d been there.
Something evil happened here in Creek Bend in the winter of 1881.
“What the hell is going on down there?” demanded Pink Shirt.
Suddenly, the worms were gone from Eric’s head. In its place was a remarkable clarity. He understood now.
LET. ME. OUT.
“Yes,” replied Eric. “I have to let you out.”
Aiden and Pink Shirt responded to this in unison: “What?”
Eric didn’t reply. He knew what he had to do. And it wasn’t going to be pretty. “The man who conspired to summon you into this world is long dead,” he told the jinn. “You can’t have him. But if that man answered to a higher power, a power that still exists in this world, even if run by new people, then maybe you can use someone else who answers to that power in his place. Someone who also conspired to use you.”
“Wait!” cried Pink Shirt. “What are you doing?”
IT IS. ACCEPTABLE.
The flames raced down the tunnel and out of sight. Eric knew that in mere moments they would seek out the man in the pink shirt, wherever he was hiding, and claim their sacrifice.
“What did you do?”
“I’m sorry,” said Eric. “But you shouldn’t have come here. These secrets were never yours.”
“No! Stay away from me!”
A piercing scream filled Eric’s ear. He closed his eyes and winced at the pain. It went on for several seconds and then the voice in his ear cut out. In the silence that remained, however, he could still hear the man screaming somewhere above him, muffled behind the concrete and wood that lay between them.
Aiden rubbed at his ear. “What did you do?”
Eric looked grim. “I saved us.”
“Saved us? But you said you were letting it out.”
“I am. But not into this world. When it was summoned here in 1881, it didn’t linger here because it wanted to come all the way through. It was trapped, unable to go either way. I’m letting it go home.”
“And Pink Shirt?”
“Ironically
, he’s the key.”
Pink Shirt’s screams died away. Then, just as suddenly as they appeared, the flames died away, retreating back into the wall and plunging the ruined room once more into utter darkness.
THANK. YOU.
Then everything was silent. That strange eye was gone. The foul breath was gone. Nothing lurked behind the crack in the wall.
“You killed him…” said Aiden.
“I know.” Eric dropped to his knees again, back into the foul, black sludge. He was trembling. He felt like he was going to throw up. “I know…”
“Are you going to be okay?”
Eric nodded. “He was going to kill us both…”
“You didn’t have a choice.”
But Eric still felt awful. Pink Shirt… The cowboy… The foggy man last year… Three people were dead now because of him. The fact that he’d had no choice in any of those deaths didn’t make that any easier to deal with.
Aiden took him by the arm and helped him to his feet. “Come on. Let’s go home.”
But Eric shook his head. “Not yet. We’re not done.”
Aiden was confused. “We’re not?”
“There’s still something left to do.” He turned toward the boiler room and aimed his phone toward it to light the way. Shining back at him from the gloom was a pair of eerie, white eyes.
Chapter Forty-Five
The strange, black creature led them out of the basement and back up the stairs to the far end of the third floor, where they found another unseen doorway.
Immediately, Eric realized that they had found the tower.
Three stories tall and beginning on the school’s third floor, it reached an impressive five stories in all. Small, with windows on all four walls on all three levels and the least amount of fire damage in the entire building, it was by far the sunniest space he’d seen since stepping through the ruined front doors. Compared to the rest of the building, it was almost cheerful.
A strange commingling of odors filled the air here, including, of course, the overpowering stench of smoke that permeated every other room. But almost as strong here was a pungent smell of burned bacon, punctuated with the more flavorful scents of peppers and garlic and herbs, reminding him suddenly that he hadn’t eaten a bite since breakfast. There was also a faint, lingering odor of incense and scented candles overlaying the distinctly sterile stink of bleach and ammonia.
Candles were laid out on every surface, ready to lend light when the sun went down. A pair of filthy rubber boots sat beside the door. A rain coat and a worn jacket hung from nails in the nearby wall. Several gallon jugs of water, both empty and full, sat in a neat row along one wall.
This part of the school was not only still livable, but appeared to have been comfortably occupied for some time.
The creature bounded up the stairs, leading them toward the old school’s highest room. A second creature was curled up in a corner on the tower’s empty middle level. It opened its blank eyes only briefly before closing them again, uninterested in the two visitors.
The highest floor of the tower was a stark contrast to the lower two. It was cluttered and untidy. A surprising amount of furniture had been hauled up the steps and squeezed into this cramped space. An old recliner that must have been a monster to haul all the way up here was wedged between a lopsided dresser and an old chest. There was a small television stand sitting against the railing. Instead of a television, it held a propane camp stove with a dirty, cast-iron skillet sitting on one burner. A cable connected the stove to a fat fuel tank in the corner. More water jugs sat on the floor around the makeshift kitchen, along with several plastic, five-gallon buckets. Next to this, a small table, littered with dirty plasticware, partially blocked the stairs. A single chair was pushed neatly in. Throughout the room, several camping lanterns dangled from chains connected to the ceiling by sturdy hooks.
It was not unlike the apartment where he first found Aiden, he realized. Except that this strange little lair had clearly been evolving for a very long time. Given enough years to collect all these things, he had no doubt that the apartment over Big Brooke Tavern would have eventually gained the added amenities of junkyard furniture, campsite cooking and propane lighting.
Whoever lived here had even taken up a number of hobbies. There was an old telescope in the corner. A radio sat on one of the many window sills, next to a police scanner. A pile of jigsaw puzzles stood on a plastic chair. The rest of the area was filled with books. Countless volumes of all manner of literature were arranged in high stacks, filling every available space, turning the room into a veritable labyrinth. The creature moved deeper into the clutter, slinking around a scarred coffee table on which books were stacked almost to the ceiling.
It should have been dark and dreary in here amid all this stuff, and yet the large windows that dominated the walls on all sides left the room illuminated enough that it was remarkably cheerful. And the view through those windows was breathtaking. The whole of Creek Bend spread out in every direction around them, clean and crisp in the evening sunshine.
It was almost surreal to see such a brilliant blue sky after the utter darkness they had endured in the basement.
And yet, from the corner of his eyes, Eric was sure he glimpsed a darting shadow, just like the ones he’d seen downstairs.
The two of them followed the black creature to the back of the room, past a large, wooden desk that must have been salvaged from an office somewhere below. It stood propped up on one side with a pile of broken bricks because the legs had been burned off it. More books were stacked on either side of the desk, while in the center lay a pile of maps, not unlike the one Aiden lost in the rail car.
Behind the desk, a number of articles had been clipped and taped to the wall between the windows. Eric caught sight of a story he recognized from last fall, about a bizarre accident at a factory owned by Vertical Industries.
In the far corner of the cluttered room, wedged between even more impressive stacks of old books, stood a single, twin-sized bed, piled high with blankets and several pillows. Standing next to this bed with his back turned to them, staring out the window at the city below, was a very old, very frail looking man.
As the black creature settled itself on the floor beside him, he turned and gave them a bright, welcoming smile.
“Finally!” the old man sighed, beaming at them.
Eric recognized the voice immediately. “You’re the one who found my phone.”
“I am.”
“And left me that note.”
The old man nodded. “And you did magnificently. I never doubted you for a minute.”
“I’m glad one of us didn’t.”
The old man laughed heartily at this, but Eric wasn’t really joking…
“Who are you?”
“I’m Frank,” replied the old man.
Eric found that he was surprised. He’d grown used to having to refer to the people he was meeting today by silly nicknames. “Frank. Okay.”
“Frank Lezner.” He stepped forward and reached out with a long, bony hand for Eric to shake. It felt frightfully fragile. And yet the man seemed to be full of energy.
“I’m Eric Fortrell…”
“I know. I’ve known since before you did.”
Eric blinked, confused. “I’m sorry?”
“I have a lot to tell you and not much time. Death is lingering.”
“Death…?” All day long, this man had been speaking of death. At first, he’d mistaken it for a threat, but as they day went on it seemed to be more of a warning. He thought the foretold death was Aiden’s, or perhaps his own, or even Paul’s. But was he referring to his own death?
“That’s why it was so important for you to hurry. I don’t have much time. I wasn’t even sure I was going to make it back up all those stairs.”
“Should we get you to a hospital or something?” asked Aiden.
He let out another laugh. He didn’t sound sick. He looked old and frail, even a little tired, bu
t he didn’t remotely appear to be a man on the brink of death. “God no. I’ve been around way too long as it is. I’m ready to go. I just need to talk to you two first.”
“Well we’re here now,” Eric assured him.
“I hadn’t realized how short my time was. I’ve been putting it off for so long, waiting for you both, for years now.”
“Years?” said Eric. “I only found out about this stuff this morning.”
“True. But that doesn’t mean that all this stuff wasn’t expecting you.”
“What?”
But Frank turned his eyes to Aiden now. “Glen always knew you’d find your way here.”
“You knew Glen?”
Frank smiled. “Of course I did. Who do you think told him about the secret of the unseen in the first place?”
Aiden looked stunned. “You?”
Frank nodded. “Back when he was working for them.”
“The nameless organization,” said Eric, “filled with nameless goons.”
“Not all of them are nameless. I’ve met a few who prefer to retain their identities. Usually higher-ups.”
Now that he was thinking about it, he did recall Father Billy telling him once that he’d worked for a man named Saulkin.
“I don’t need to tell you how dangerous those people are.”
“No. You don’t.”
From the corner of his eye, he glimpsed another shadow moving beneath the windows. When he turned to look at it, another darted between the books on the other side.
The old man sat down on the bed and closed his eyes for a moment, as if tired. When he opened them again, he said, “It’s ironic. All the years I waited for this chance… And I don’t even have time to tell you everything.”
Forgetting about the shadows for the time being, Eric stepped toward the old man, concerned. “Is there anything we can do?”
“Just listen carefully to what I can tell you.”
Eric nodded.
“This is all about Howard.”
“Howard?” He looked at Aiden, confused.
“You met him.”
“I did?”
