by A. I. Nasser
I have a bad feeling about this.
Michael ignored the little voice in the back of his head. He had made it. He was finally here. This is what he had been looking for, but it was nothing like the images he had constructed back when the mystery had plagued him. There was nothing here, save for a dying maple a few yards away that looked grotesque in the midst of what should have been a beautiful backdrop of greenery.
Michael stepped forward, leaves crunching beneath his shoes as he made his way towards the old tree. It looked familiar, but he couldn’t tell why. He had never been here before, but for some reason, he felt like he was supposed to know where he was. He wracked his mind, searching for any memory as to why he felt this way, but all that did was hurt his head, and he quickly gave up on it.
The maple stood tall before him, a once majestic tree from what he could make out from its massive trunk and thick branches. Now, it looked sick, rotting in the middle of this open field, bent at an impossible angle as if under the weight of the gods themselves. Michael looked around him for any other trees that had met the same fate, and his eyes fell on several stumps across the open field. This was the last one standing, a renegade that had survived the harshness of solitude, but was now dying like its fallen comrades.
A slight breeze picked up, and Michael closed his eyes as the chill air raced around him, bringing with it a stench that made him gag.
He wasn’t supposed to be here.
The realization washed over him suddenly, and he felt his body shudder in panic. He had crossed a line. He could feel it as clearly as the wind against his skin. He had to turn back, leave this place quickly, even if it meant dropping the flashlight in his hand and racing like a madman through the woods back home.
Now! Leave now!
Michael hesitated, and that was enough.
He heard the sound of the earth beneath his feet break right before a hand curled around his ankle. Michael screamed out in pain, the cold grasp agonizingly tight as nails dug into his skin. A rush of fire raced up and through his entire body, as if whatever was holding him had suddenly lit a fire to his leg and was quickly consuming him. Michael tried to pull away, but that only made the hand’s grip tighten even more, and he could feel the nails dig deeper into him.
Michael fell to the ground in a heap, but the hand never let go. He kicked at it, yelling at the top of his lungs, scraping at the earth as he tried to free himself of the vice-like grip. It was of no use, though, and when he felt his body being pulled forward, closer to the rotting tree, Michael began to fight back even harder.
“Cole.”
The voice pierced through his ears and into his head, racing about in his mind, scratching at the inside of his head. Michael clasped his head, squeezing against the feeling of nails scraping bone, overwhelmed by the sudden burst of pain shooting through him. He forgot all about the hand around his ankle, his attention fully shifted to getting that voice out of his head.
“Cole.”
“Get out!” Michael screamed into the night.
He felt an invisible force reach inside him and grab him from within, pinning him down into the earth and forcing the breath out of him. He was going to die. This was the end of it. This was why his father had warned him about the dark. He had been foolish and had let his curiosity get the better of him, and now he was going to die.
Arms shot out from either side of Michael and wrapped themselves around his chest, hugging him to the ground. Michael opened his eyes for a brief instant and saw the rotting skin flapping in the wind. He could see the flesh beneath, black and oozing, emitting a stench that threatened to suffocate him. He tried to fight his attacker, tried to break free of the arms around him, but it was useless.
The earth shifted again, and this time Michael could feel the movement by his head. He closed his eyes against what he would see, and when he felt the touch of wet flesh against his cheek, he thrashed harder against his captor. The arms around him pressed down harder, and suddenly Michael was gasping for air.
“You have come to me, Cole.”
The voice was close now, and Michael could feel the monster’s warm breath against his ear, the slapping of a tongue against teeth.
“The children,” came the raspy sound of sandpaper against wood. “Bring me the children. Bring them all to me.”
Michael cringed as the smell of the monster’s breath raced into his nose, and for a split second, he was grateful he couldn’t breathe. The thought of having that stench in his lungs made him shudder.
“Bring me the children, or Melington will burn.”
The arms pressed down harder, and Michael could almost feel his ribs cracking beneath their weight.
“Say it, Cole,” the voice hissed. “Say it.”
Michael opened his mouth to speak, but the words didn’t come out. He felt his head spin with the lack of oxygen, and he knew that he only had seconds left before he wound up dead out here in a field no one knew, alone to rot beneath the dying tree.
“Say it!”
“I’ll bring them!” Michael gasped, his voice cracking. “I’ll bring them to you!”
The weight on his chest suddenly lifted, and as the arms drew away, nails dug into his chest and scratched, cutting deep. Michael gasped for air, his body ignoring the pain that came with the broken skin and blood pouring out from his wounds. The cold rushed down his throat and into his lungs, filling them with damp air and forcing him to cough as he rolled over onto his side.
He could barely move, the spinning in his head forcing him to close his eyes as he drifted away.
Michael lay completely still in the open field, alone in the darkness with only the sound of the wind around him, and a distant, raspy chuckle echoing through the night.
Six Months Ago
“Investments made it easier.
As soon as money had begun rolling into Melington, offering children up for Copper had stopped becoming a problem.
The hospital was our first priority. It wasn’t hard to fake stillbirths, and very few people asked about it later. We invested a lot into it, building it up so that we serviced the neighboring towns as well. At first, it took a lot of effort, and it was hard choosing the right people to work with. Nobody was comfortable with doing what needed to be done. Hell, we weren’t comfortable with it.
When it was clear that we would need a back-up, Daniel Cole suggested the schools. We opened our doors wide, accepting ridiculous real-estate deals and business development plans, all with the promise of bringing in more people.
It worked, and a little too well. I look outside this window and see a town that I hardly recognize anymore. Sometimes I forget I am still in Melington, if not for the older parts of town that still make me feel nostalgic every time I drive through them. I walk down the streets and look at the many faces, strangers who had been promised a family friendly home, but whose children could very well be our next victims.
Don’t look at me like that. Do you think I enjoyed it? It was a burden I had to bear, and I bore it alone, long after your father died and you had set off to make a life for yourself. But I knew that I wouldn’t be free of my duties, even when you had gone away. If I ever wanted to ensure the safety of our family’s children, I had to keep playing my part.
We all did. We could not escape our destiny, and as long as Copper Tibet existed, as long as that monster could come back from the dead whenever he damn well pleased, there would be members of the founding families right here doing what needed to be done to ensure the survival of their line. We all knew it, and we had all made peace with it in our own ways.
At least, that’s what we had thought.
Alan’s father had changed that completely.”
Chapter 5
Rachel Adams looked at her watch for what she could only assume was the tenth time in the last half-hour. Deborah was late, and Rachel was beginning to think that her daughter would not show up at all. She gestured to the waiter, asked for a refill of coffee, and settled back comf
ortably in her seat.
She had chosen a corner table, away from the rest of the afternoon crowd but strategically placed so she had a complete view of the café. She could also see the door clearly from where she sat, and every time someone other than Deborah walked in, Rachel would sigh in frustration and look at her watch again.
It had been almost a month since her last encounter with her daughter. Rachel was finding it difficult to handle the cold shoulder, much more accustomed to being the one in charge of the direction her interactions took. Never in her life had she ever let the other party dictate the terms of their relationship; even her husband had struggled with that part of her. Yet, here she was, sitting alone at a café table, waiting for her daughter who was refusing to even talk to her.
Rachel had misjudged the ramifications of telling Deborah the truth. She had always known her daughter had a soft heart, but she had assumed that when push came to shove, Deborah would do what needed to be done. Rachel had assumed wrong.
The door to the café opened, and Rachel finally smiled as her daughter walked in and made straight for her mother’s table.
“I was scared you wouldn’t come,” Rachel said.
“I almost didn’t,” Deborah said, pulling out a seat and immediately sitting down.
Rachel felt her daughter’s coldness like a slap across the face, but quickly got a hold of herself and sat down as well. Deborah gestured for the waiter.
“How’s Alan?” Rachel asked after her daughter made her order.
“It’s really none of your business,” Deborah replied.
“That’s not fair, Deborah.”
“It’s all I’ve got.”
Rachel settled back into her seat as both women eyed each other from across the table, each waiting for the other to blow up. When it was clear neither of them would, Deborah sighed and shook her head in frustration.
“What do you want, mother?”
“For starters, I’d like us to get over all this and return to being civil,” Rachel said. “I know how you feel towards me, and I can’t change what I did, but you have to understand there’s a lot more hanging on the line than just us.”
“I think we’re way past civil,” Deborah said. “You lied to me, tricked me, and waited until I almost lost Alan to tell me anything about what was going on in this town. How did you expect me to react?”
“With a little more brain and a lot less emotion.”
“Don’t push it,” Deborah warned. “I’m here because Alan asked me to be here, nothing else. I don’t owe you anything, and I can handle pissing him off.”
Rachel clicked her tongue and nodded, waiting patiently for the waiter to set Deborah’s drink in front of her and ask if she needed anything else. When the women were alone again, she leaned in closer to her daughter.
“I need to see Alan,” Rachel said.
“Definitely not,” Deborah replied. “You’re done with the Carters. After what you bastards did to his sister, I’d rather die before I let you anywhere near him.”
“You’re not his keeper, Deborah,” Rachel said, her tone more aggressive than she would have liked. “You can’t keep him locked away forever.”
“I don’t tell Alan what to do,” Deborah hissed. “If he really wants to see you, then I can’t stop him.”
“He won’t meet with me because of you. Do you think I don’t know that?”
“Then you’re out of luck, mother,” Deborah smiled, sipping at her coffee while her eyes danced angrily across Rachel’s face.
Rachel sighed angrily and tossed her hands in the air. She was getting too old to handle what she could only describe as childish tantrums. Sometimes she wished Deborah were still a toddler and she could really give her a piece of her mind without consequence.
“Alan’s important, now more than ever,” Rachel said. “He freed Copper Tibet, and it’s his responsibility to see this through.”
“Why don’t you ask Daniel Cole to perform another blood binding?” Deborah sneered. “Oh, right, I forgot, the bastard’s a vegetable now.”
“I won’t approve another blood binding.”
“Because you have a say in what the Council decides?”
“Yes!” Rachel slammed a hand down on the table, wincing when heads turned to look at them. She smiled and nodded quickly at the faces she recognized before shifting her attention back to her daughter. “I’m Chairman. The Council does what I tell them to do.”
“Then tell them Alan’s through,” Deborah said. “He played his part. Copper’s gone, and that’s the end of it.”
“Gone?” Rachel scoffed. “We’ve had four missing children reports in the last six months. Copper’s still kicking, and we’re covering it up.”
Deborah’s mouth dropped open as she stared at her mother in surprise. Just when she had thought things couldn’t get worse between them, Rachel Adams had found a way to prove her wrong. Sitting across the table, Deborah started to see her mother in a completely different light, and it scared her more than the impression she already had.
“You’re doing a great job filling in for the Coles,” Deborah finally said.
Rachel bit back her tongue, a verbal lashing the easiest way to turn a bad situation sour. “We can’t control this,” she said after a beat. “Alan’s the only one I know who can.”
“Why?” Deborah asked. “Why him?”
“He’s the only one who’s ever come back,” Rachel replied.
Deborah remembered Alan’s nightmares, suddenly wondering if maybe his dreams did have something to do with the coma he had been in. She shook her head, refusing to believe there was still any connection between him and that monster.
“That means nothing,” Deborah said.
Rachel felt goose bumps break out across her skin at her daughter’s hesitation. “Something’s happening to him, isn’t it?”
“I said, it’s none of your business,” Deborah said. “The Carters are off limits.”
“The Carters are the reason we’re in this mess to begin with,” Rachel hissed, “from the day this town burned Copper Tibet alive until the night Alan Carter denied the monster a child. Now that thing’s free to pick up whoever it wants, and there’s no way to stop it without Alan.”
Deborah opened her mouth to reply, but couldn’t find the words to say.
“Deborah, please,” Rachel whispered. “Forget about the Council. They’ve all sent their children away. Think about the ones that are still here.”
Deborah hated her mother instantly. She hated her for being right, for putting her in this position, and for making her feel that, in some sick and twisted way, the lives of the children in Melington were in her hands. She hated her more than she could have thought possible, and it made agreeing with her much harder.
Rachel reached out and took Deborah’s hand in hers, and was surprised when her daughter didn’t pull away.
“Look past our issues, Debbie,” Rachel said. “We can solve them, or not. It doesn’t matter right now. What matters is stopping that thing once and for all, and I can’t do it alone. The Council won’t budge as long as their children are not in any immediate danger, and I’m already losing credit with the Sheriff. There’s no telling what Fiona would do if the Council decided to give her free reign to handle this on her own. And don’t think she won’t come after Alan. As far as she’s concerned, he’s the reason we’re all in this mess to begin with.”
“Alan didn’t do anything wrong,” Deborah defended. “This could have been solved if the Council had been honest, if at least you hadn’t lied to me.”
Rachel nodded quickly, squeezing her daughter’s hand in reassurance. “And none of this would have happened if our ancestors hadn’t burned Copper in that field. The past is the past, Debbie. The real question is what we’re going to do now.”
Deborah sighed and pulled her hand away. “And what do you suggest?”
Rachel gave her daughter a weak smile. “I need to talk with Alan.”
Debora
h bit her lower lip, eyeing her mother as she thought about what the two of them sitting down together would mean. She hadn’t told Alan the complete story, purposely leaving out the part where the Council had offered up his sister. She had been too scared to mention it, unable to face what that could do to him once he knew. She couldn’t see how a meeting with her mother could progress without that coming up, and there was no telling how he would react.
“I need to talk to him first,” Deborah said.
Rachel sat back and nodded. “Just hurry,” she said. “I feel like time isn’t really on our side.”
Deborah looked at her mother, suddenly feeling the weight of the world on her shoulders.
Alan wasn’t going to like any of this.
***
“I’m not sure if I should be telling you about this.”
David Whelm smiled at the couple sitting in front of him. He took a sip from his ice tea, placed it squarely on the coaster and rubbed his hands together as he looked from one to the other.
“Mr. Taylor,” he started. “I have been doing this for a very long time. The fact that authorities would stall work on a certain case for their own benefit is not unheard of in the big cities.”
“Yes, but Melington is not a big town,” the petite brunette interrupted. “We’ve been here for three years. We’ve never had a problem here before this.”
David nodded. “I’m sure this town is great, but your son has been missing for a good two weeks now, and you said there hasn’t been any headway made so far.”
David had found out about Jerry and Samantha Taylor from the locals. After his run-in with the Sheriff, he had called his editor and had postponed his return back to New York. There was something going on in this town, and ever since he’d been shot down at Town Hall, his resignation to find out what that was increased ten-fold. There was definitely a story here, and he was going to be the man to tell it.
Jerry Taylor worked construction on one of the newer compounds spurting up on the outskirts of Melington. He had filed a missing person’s report for his son Harry two weeks before, and as time went by, the unhappy couple were already starting to make peace with the fact that little Harry Taylor was gone forever. The explanations ranged from accidental drowning to simply losing himself in the massive woods around town. But, David felt there was a lot more to it than that.
