by Jen Blood
Rebecca Ashmont, or someone claiming to be Rebecca Ashmont, said she would tell me all my father’s secrets. Secrets my mother knew and refused to share; secrets Noel Hammond and possibly the entire Payson Church had died for.
“Do you think it was really Rebecca who called me?” I asked.
“I don’t know. But someone wanted us here… And we didn’t imagine that gunshot.”
No, we didn’t. I thought of Diggs’ voice on the phone; the fact that he was on his way here now. For what?
“So—boarding house next,” I finally agreed.
“It makes the most sense.”
Right. I started to walk away, but he caught my arm. I turned. He held up his hand before I could ask what he wanted. I stopped. Speaking, moving. Breathing.
A low moan rose on the cold night air, traveling like fingernails up the base of my spine.
Juarez pushed on my shoulder and I crouched down again. He did the same. I stayed that way, trapped between the cold stone wall and Jack’s warm body, for another thirty seconds or more before the sound stopped just shy of a wail.
The world went quiet again.
“What the hell was that?” I whispered when I could speak again.
“No idea,” he whispered back. He backed away from me but stayed low against the wall. He nodded in the general direction of the field. “I think it came from out there.”
Of course it did.
I followed him back outside, as much because I didn’t want to be left alone as anything. We’d come from the right before; now, Juarez went in the opposite direction. I kept two steps behind, looking over my shoulder for any sign of the monster I was sure lurked in the shadows.
We were back in the field, fighting our way through a dense thicket of thorns and brush, when Juarez stopped. He pointed up ahead. It took a second or two before my eyes adjusted enough to sort out the shapes and make sense of what I was seeing.
Another two or three yards, and the thorns and brush cleared to open field again. Someone was there. Dressed in black, barely discernible in the high grass, a figure lay on the ground.
Whoever it was, he—or she—wasn’t moving.
Juarez and I crept closer, his gun trained on the inert form.
The second we were close enough to see who it was, Juarez dropped his gun to his side. He ordered me back and rushed in without so much as a glance in either direction to make sure he was safe. I waited with the blood rushing in my ears while he knelt beside Matt Perkins and checked for a pulse.
Apparently, he found one because a minute later Jack took off his jacket, wadded it up, and put it under Matt’s head. I got closer. The front of the old man’s shirt was stained with blood, his eyes wide and his face twisted with pain. He stared at Jack like he’d never seen him before.
I took a step back and tripped on something lying beside him, barely managing to right myself before I fell.
A shovel. While Juarez tended Matt, I focused on the site where we’d found him. A few feet away was a hole maybe four feet long, some spots deeper than others—like Matt had been searching for something buried there. I looked closer. It didn’t take long to find what that had been.
At the far end of the hole, the moonlight reflected off something hard and pale white. I got closer. Knelt in the cold, damp earth, and brushed the dirt away.
A human skull.
“Jack,” I said. I forgot to whisper. The sound of my voice was almost as jarring as the gunshot we’d heard back on the water.
He didn’t answer.
I swept away more dirt until the entire head was exposed. If I was Kat, of course, I could tell something from the skeleton—male or female, age, race… Something. All I saw was a human skull with a very prominent hole in its forehead. I turned to look at Jack. He was kneeling over Matt, but I caught the confusion on his face when he looked in my direction. I turned back to my own task as he returned to his.
A skeleton. It wasn’t an infant, but other than that I couldn’t tell anything. I was trying to clear more of the dirt when my finger snagged on something sharp. I pulled it back as blood dripped from a cut in my index finger. I ignored the blood and the dull pain and the imminent threat of tetanus, and set back to work until I’d fully excavated what I had found.
A glass crucifix.
Rosary beads of bone.
I rubbed the dirt from the rosary until I could make out the name etched in the glass:
Zion.
August 22, 1990
The rain comes late that night—well past midnight, while Rebecca waits inside the greenhouse for whatever is about to happen. She still smells Isaac on her, is raw from his caresses and the violence of their union after Joe left. In the moment, she had thought it would change something, being with Isaac like this again. Now, she realizes that is not the case—there was a sense of finality in their parting that she can no longer ignore.
Now, she is back to the decision she had hoped she would not have to make. She thought once her mind was made up she would feel some sort of peace at the resolution, but all she feels is sadness.
She will go. Zion will stay.
Isaac returned to the house a short time ago, but Rebecca remains, waiting for the rain. The heavens open and the skies weep with a fury she understands all too well. She is exhausted. Confused. Bitter, when she knows she should not be. Isaac will guide her son. She will find her own path, whatever that may be. She sits on the ground inside the greenhouse with her back against the cold stone. By the time someone finally comes, she is nearly asleep.
The man who stands in the doorway isn’t the one she expects, however, and apprehension wells in her chest at sight of the boy at his side.
“Matt?”
“What’s going on, Mom?” Zion asks. His hair is wet, and rain washes down his cheeks in rivers. His eyes are still bleary from sleep. “Uncle Matt said you needed me.”
She stands and goes to them. They come in out of the rain; outside, the sudden onslaught after the long drought has washed away topsoil and already flooded the path in places. Matt is soaked. He looks drawn and frightened, but resolute in that way that always meant trouble when they were younger. When Matt makes a decision, few can sway him.
“You talked to Joe?” she asks.
“He said you won’t come. I told him maybe this time you need somebody else to make the choice for you. Adam and Diggins aren’t part of this—it’s none of their business. It’s just us. Like always. I’ll take you somewhere safe—Joe says he won’t stop us.”
Zion looks bewildered, more childlike than she has seen him in years. “Take us? We’re happy here. Isaac is teaching me. This is where we belong now.”
“You don’t belong with a degenerate who’s twisting your minds,” Matt snaps. Zion backs away. Matt has always been unpredictable—affectionate one moment, troubled and broken the next. Though she has never been on the receiving end of his ire, in many ways Rebecca still prefers Joe’s violence to Matt’s. There is at least some semblance of control when Joe lashes out. The world makes her husband angry, but demons drive Matt.
“Let him go,” she says quietly. It is an order, simple and clear. Matt hesitates only a moment before he obeys.
“Zion, go back to the house,” she says.
“You should come with me,” Zion says. She notes that he does take a few steps away from Matt, however, until he is standing just out of his reach.
“I’ll be there soon. You need sleep.”
“You’ll come say goodnight?” he asks. The doubt is plain in his voice.
“Of course,” she lies. Zion looks at her, rain dripping down his face, and she can see that he does not believe her. He turns, regardless.
“Goodbye, Uncle Matt.”
Before he can go far, Matt reaches for her son again. This time, all trace of uncertainty is gone—he holds tight to Zion’s arm and takes a step toward Rebecca. A crack of thunder rocks the night. Lightning flashes just seconds later.
“You have to come w
ith me,” Matt says. He pulls Zion into the greenhouse. Closer to Rebecca. Farther from the church. “We have to go. I came here for both of you.”
“I’ll go with you,” Rebecca says. “Zion has to stay. He has a destiny.”
There isn’t a trace of surprise on Zion’s face when he meets her gaze. “You don’t need to go with him,” her son says.
“I do.” She doesn’t cry, and she doesn’t waver. “You belong here. I don’t. We’ll write; I’ll visit. You will do great things.”
Matt still has hold of Zion’s arm. His fear breeds desperation, a darkness to his eyes that all but obliterates the gentle man Rebecca loves. Zion starts to struggle, intensifying his efforts at the first traces of fear on his mother’s face. An instant later, his struggling ceases when a familiar voice intercedes.
“Let him go.”
Isaac stands tall, silhouetted against the gray night and driving rain. As though too stunned to argue, Matt releases the boy’s arm. Zion races to Isaac’s side.
“You can’t have him,” Matt says. There is a tremor in his voice and fury that borders on madness in his eyes.
“I am merely God’s instrument,” Isaac says smoothly. “Zion is here for a reason. You cannot stand in the way of the will of God.”
Zion takes Isaac’s hand. “He wants to take my mother. Tell him she must stay, too.”
Isaac says nothing. She can see the moment when Zion understands the reality of what is happening; that Isaac has banished her. That she will leave and he will stay. Tears mix with the rain still washing down his cheeks.
“You have a destiny, my son.”
Zion shakes his head roughly. She can’t remember ever seeing him cry like this. “Not without my mother. She has to stay. She has no one else to protect her—she’ll die without me.”
Isaac puts a hand on Zion’s shoulder. Rebecca has been so absorbed in their reaction that she’s nearly forgotten about Matt. His gun is already raised by the time she realizes his intent.
“Leave us!” Zion shouts, his rage directed at Matt.
Isaac’s hand flexes on Zion’s shoulder, holding him still. “Matthew, I know there are demons that haunt you.”
“Shut up,” Matt whispers.
The preacher takes a step closer. “I know the voices of those you struck down cry to you in the night—I was there, Matt. I lost my way, too. War changes a man; makes him see the worst in people. I’m here to tell you there is still good in the world. Zion exemplifies that good.”
He takes another step forward. Matt steps back, the gun still raised. He is trembling.
“I want you to take Rebecca and leave this island,” Isaac says. Zion flinches as though a blow has been struck.
“No!” her son cries.
Isaac holds up his hand. Turns on the boy. “God has made his wishes plain to me. He has told me what your path holds.”
“I don’t care about God’s plan, then,” Zion says. His voice is choked with tears. Isaac ignores him and advances on Matt, faster now, his hand outstretched.
“Give me the gun, Matthew,” he says. “Leave here. Take the woman and don’t return.”
Zion tries to run past them both to get to his mother, but Isaac holds him back. Rebecca takes a step toward him. The wind rises and the trees moan and the heavens rain down. Isaac is smiling. Zion is possessed. Matt stands perfectly still, terrified. Something is about to happen—she feels it in a bone-deep pause, as though God himself is holding his breath. Waiting.
There is another crack of thunder, another flash of lightning that illuminates the night. A scream dies in Rebecca’s throat when she sees the man standing to their left, at the very center of the greenhouse. He is dressed in black, a hood up around his head, a cruel smile on his thin lips. The Angel of Death, Rebecca thinks suddenly. Has he been here the entire time?
Matt turns toward her to find out what’s wrong. Isaac takes the opportunity to wrest the gun from his grasp, still holding Zion close. Rebecca watches and she knows in the way that mothers always know, the moment that Matt’s finger grazes the trigger. The smile vanishes from Isaac’s lips. A crack that sounds like the end of the world tears through the night. Matt cries out.
Zion does not.
Chapter Thirty-Three
Nursing my bloody finger, I crawled back to Jack and Matt. When I reached them, Jack looked at me like he’d forgotten I was there. The old man’s chest rose and fell in shallow, useless gasps—the final breaths of a dying man.
“Matt, who killed Zion?” I asked.
He blinked. His face was wet with tears. “I did,” he whispered. Jack stared at him.
“Just the body,” Matt said. “I killed the body—he’ll rise. I thought I found him.” He looked at Juarez with madness shining in his rheumy blue eyes. “I thought I found him, but it was a lie—I was wrong. She told me you were him. We believed. But if you’re him, he can’t still be in the ground. Joe says he’s dead.”
I tried to think of a question. As it happened, I didn’t need to; now that he’d started, Matt continued without being prompted.
“Everything got jumbled that night—everybody was moving. Isaac wouldn’t let us go. Zion wouldn’t leave Becca; Isaac wouldn’t let us take him.” More tears leaked down his face. He coughed and a trail of bloody spittle flowed down his chin.
“I shot them both,” he said.
“You shot Isaac?” I asked.
“Shot him dead. And Zion. Two birds with one stone.”
“Then who am I?” Jack asked. “If I’m not Zion…?”
Matt looked like he’d just been presented with some indecipherable riddle. “I don’t know who you are,” he said finally. “A boy who looked like Zion, grown to a man with no past. I thought you were him.”
I was still trying to put everything together when a branch broke off to the left. Juarez went for his gun. Before he could fire, Joe Ashmont emerged from the brush and stood tall at the edge of his son’s grave.
He was limping, a rag tied tight around his right thigh. His clothes were wet, his face black with grime. He held his shotgun in both hands, as though it would be too heavy otherwise.
“You knew all this?” I asked. “That Zion was dead? You knew what happened the night before the fire?”
Joe nodded. “I knew all Matt’s secrets. Just learned everybody else’s, though.”
“Why did you try to kill my mother?”
He ignored the question. “I’ve been telling them for years the boy was dead—I was there, I watched him die. But Becca had it stuck in her head that he was coming back, and anything Becca was selling Matt always bought. Right, Matty?” He leaned forward, eyeing Matt’s bleeding form.
“He dead?” Ashmont asked me.
Matt coughed. Something that looked a lot like relief crossed Ashmont’s face before it vanished.
“So Rebecca’s still alive?” I asked.
“Not now,” he said. Fast, short. Grief or anger or some combination of the two made him look away from me for a second or two, while he got himself back together.
“You killed her,” I said.
“Who the hell do you think I am—you think I just go around murdering every woman I see? I didn’t touch Becca. Twenty-two years, I’ve kept her secrets. Fed her, nursed her, kept outsiders from coming in here, while her and Matt kept on with the delusion that her fuckin’ kid was the second coming. He’s in the ground, Matty,” he said, addressing his old friend. Matt stirred.
Ashmont shook his head.
“Batshit crazy—both of ’em,” he said, half to himself.
“Did you know my father’s still alive?” I asked. “Do you know where he is now?” He barely acknowledged me—I might as well have been talking to the air.
I looked back to Matt for more answers than Ashmont had provided thus far. Juarez had brushed the hair from the old man’s forehead. He prayed quietly, while Matt continued to leak blood and gasp for breath.
“What about the fire?” I asked Matt. “And my fat
her—Rebecca said she knew a secret about my father. Do you know what she was talking about?”
A flash of panic crossed the old man’s pain-filled eyes. “They killed Becca. They warned us—it’s what happens when you start telling secrets.”
Matt closed his eyes. I turned to Ashmont, who was watching all of this with only mild interest. He’d dropped the shotgun to his side and was using it to prop himself up.
“Who’s they?” I asked. I took a step toward him, no longer mindful of staying out of sight. Ashmont just smiled. “Who set the fire, dammit? Who attacked my mother?”
He looked past me, straight into the woods. Matt started coughing. Jack knelt beside him and tried to staunch a fresh flow of blood.
“I tell you and you’re dead,” Ashmont said. He still wasn’t looking at me. “Just like the rest of us—Matty’s almost there. They’ll get you too, one way or the other. Becca said it was the Angel of Death that struck the match, but you and me know better. He ain’t no angel; I don’t know who the fuck he is, but he’s just a man. Adam wants to pretend it never happened, and Kat’s the only thing standing between you and a bullet that’s had your name on it since the day you was born. There’s a stack of bodies a mile deep and they keep piling up—you really think it’s worth all that?”
I hesitated, but only for a second. “I need to know what happened.”
His eyes flitted to mine for just a second before they returned to the trees behind us. Jack was oblivious, now doing CPR on a dying man whose bloody past would chase him to the grave. I turned around. The world slowed to a series of freeze frames that my brain could barely process.
Twenty yards away, a man stood with a rifle pointed at us. He looked directly at me. In the moonlight, I could make out high cheekbones and a thin, sharp nose.
He fired.
Ashmont never flinched. Never ducked. He fell into the grave where I’d just uncovered Zion’s body, and he didn’t move again. I was dimly aware of Juarez shouting for me to get down, but I ignored him.
