The Haunting of Hounds Hollow

by Jeffrey Salane

Lucas walked cautiously over the old, wood floors, managing to avoid any possible creaks. The others followed him to the room with the locked rolltop desk.

  “Dude, this room is totally not what we’re looking for,” said Bess. She went over and tipped the books on the shelf as if she were looking for another secret passage. Nothing happened. “Congratulations, Lucas, you brought us to the most boring place in the house.”

  “I don’t know, Bess,” said Lens, studying the foxhunt photos on the wall. “These are pretty wild. Check it out. This is old-school photography.”

  As they admired the pictures, Lucas slipped over to the desk. He lifted the chain from around his neck and thumbed the tiny key he’d inherited. “Watch the door, will you?”

  “For what?” asked Bess.

  Lucas didn’t answer. He didn’t want to talk about the boy he’d seen and chased, in case it was just his imagination running away with him. That’s what his mom liked to call his visions. “Just, like, for anything,” he finished.

  Then Lucas fit the key slowly into the rolltop’s lock. Part of him was worried it would break or get stuck in there forever. There was no guarantee that it would match the desk, but Lucas felt deep in his gut that it had to. He turned the key and the latch gave way. A light but satisfying click sounded in the room. Bess and Lens moved next to him, looking on with interest.

  Gently, Lucas rolled the arched cover of the desk open. The desktop was bare except for a single notebook. At the back of the desk, there were rows and rows of small drawers, each with a different number on them.

  He opened the notebook first. The pages were yellow and old. Lucas could smell the musk of age rising with every turn. There were five words written in cursive at the top of each page: Scout, Shadow, Dakota, Duke, and Casper.

  Bess read over his shoulder. “Are those names?”

  “No idea,” Lucas murmured. “Maybe?”

  Underneath each of the names were indecipherable notes that had smudged over the years. The blue ink leaned right and was written almost in code or shorthand. The words that Lucas could make out didn’t help him understand what the journal had been used for.

  Feeding. Walking. Bitten. Muzzled.

  He closed the book and handed it to Bess, then moved on to the drawers. The first one had a heavy, red ball inside. Lucas took it out and held it in his hand. It had a stripe on it and the surface was covered with rough, tiny nicks. He bounced it on the floor and called out to Lens. “Wanna play?”

  Lucas gently tossed the ball, but Lens jumped back, acting like he’d been tossed a poisonous spider. The ball rolled to the corner of the room. “Come on, man. Not cool! This place is creepy enough, and I hate surprises.”

  “Well, now we’re even for knocking me off my bike,” said Lucas.

  “Hey, I was saving you from Devil’s Drop, Mr. X Games Extreme.”

  “Stop it, you two,” said Bess as she set down the notebook. “This thing is useless. What’s in the next drawer?”

  Lucas opened it and found an old newspaper clipping. He unfolded it, feeling the brittle paper threaten to tear with every crinkly move. When he flattened it out on the table, the header read Hounds Hollow Gazette.

  “Think your mom wrote this?” asked Lucas.

  Lens pointed to the tattered edges of the brown paper. “No way. This looks so old I don’t even think my mom was alive back then.”

  Lucas’s eyes traveled down to the headline and the article underneath:

  Fire at Sweetwater Manor

  On Friday, a fire destroyed Sweetwater Manor. The cause is unknown, but James and Martha Sweetwater survived the blaze along with their son Silas. Local residents could see the inferno for miles, and the blaze almost spread to the neighboring woods. Luckily the volunteer fire brigade was able to contain the damage, saving the town and the countryside from the threat of wildfires. If not for their dedicated work, the danger to Hounds Hollow would have been unimaginable. Unfortunately for the Sweetwater family, this fire wasn’t the first tragedy to strike, after

  The article stopped there. Lucas flipped the paper over, trying to find the rest of the story, but the back was just an advertisement for baking flour. “After?” he asked. “After what?”

  Bess shut another one of the small drawers with a clack that made Lucas flinch. “There’s nothing here,” she announced. “Unless you think this is going to help solve the mystery.” She held up a cream-colored, rubber clown and squeezed it. A surprisingly piercing squeak sounded from the toy. “Total waste of time. Where else can you check, Lucas? We need to find that control room.”

  “It’s a big house, Bess,” said Lucas. “We’ll find it, but it’s gonna take time.”

  Frustrated, Bess shook her head and walked to the window while Lucas refolded the article carefully, returned it to its original place, then slid the drawer shut with a quiet thud.

  “Aw, jeez, what is this?” Lens sounded seriously creeped out. He reached into a drawer and pulled out a ratty, old stuffed animal. The fur was matted down in clumps, and one of its plastic eyes was missing. Lens tossed it to Lucas, who caught it and instantly wished he hadn’t.

  “Ha! Now we’re even,” snapped Lens.

  “Gross, it smells like wet dog.” Lucas put it back where it came from and sniffed his hands. “Oh, great, I smell like it.”

  Lens sniffed his hands, too, and gagged. The two friends laughed.

  Lucas searched through the other drawers. Each one hid a single item. There was a knotted rope, a torn-up tennis ball, and some real bones with sharp teeth marks notched into the edges. One drawer made Lucas stop completely. He picked up a charred triangular object and showed it to Lens. “Is this dried mango?” he asked.

  Lens’s face screwed up as he jumped backward. “Nah, I’ve seen that before. It’s a pig’s ear.”

  Lucas threw it back in and wiped his hands against his shirt. “Why would Silas keep a pig’s ear? And why lock it in a desk drawer?”

  “Maybe it was a good luck pig,” said Bess, and Lens cracked up.

  “It’s not funny.” Lucas felt the back of his neck get hot. He pulled at his shirt collar and realized that he was sweating a little. “How do you know what it is, anyway, Lens?”

  “They sell them at pet stores now.” He grimaced at the thought. “They’re by the front register, just this box of crispy pig’s ears. I think dogs like to chew on them. So gross.”

  “Why’s that any grosser than bacon?” asked Bess.

  “I don’t know,” said Lens. “It just is.”

  Lucas tried another drawer, but it wouldn’t open all the way. He pulled harder, but it kept its hold. Whatever was inside was packed tight. Lucas worked his finger into a thin opening at the top. The drawer suddenly clamped against him, pinching his finger, and Lucas had to wiggle it back out. He shook his hand and sucked in sharply, trying to chase away the sudden bite of pain.

  “Mime mo-kay,” Lucas said through his gritted teeth. He put his finger in his mouth and bit at the sides of it, like he was forming it back into its normal finger shape. “What are you hiding in there, Silas?”

  Leaving the stubborn drawer, Lucas opened the last one. There was an oddly shaped whistle inside. Its chain rattled as he lifted it out of the desk. Instinctually, Lucas put the whistle to his mouth and blew softly. There wasn’t any noise. He tried again, harder this time, but the whistle still didn’t work. “Must be broken.”

  Bess reached for the whistle. “It’s for dogs.” She blew into it as hard as she could. Lucas flinched, expecting a loud shriek, but only a light wheeze came out of the tiny whistle.

  “Told you it was broken,” Lucas said.

  “Oh, it works, but only for dogs,” Bess explained. “See, the sound is too high for humans to hear, but to dogs it’s really loud.”

  “Cool.” Lucas smiled nervously and wondered if the small stray dog might hear the noise and start barking.

  Bess took the whistle and put the chain around Lucas’s neck like it was an Olympic med
al. “Listen, this room is a bust, but I’m awarding you a dog whistle for participation. Now, is there another place we can check?”

  “Yeah, like one that isn’t so hot?” asked Lens. Beads of sweat were forming on his brow as he tried to close the window. The evening heat was suddenly sweltering.

  “That window doesn’t close,” said Lucas as he went to grab the red ball that had rolled across the floor. “Guys, I think Silas might have been a big dog person. The whistle, the notebook, all these toys. I mean, it’s weird to lock this stuff up, but I’d better put everything back the way we found it, just in case Eartha comes snooping. There are rules in this house, after all.” Lucas leaned over to get the ball, and the whistle around his neck dangled in front of him. Without thinking, he put the whistle in his mouth and breathed through it while he reset the desk.

  Then he heard a chilling howl echo from the world outside. Lucas dropped the red ball and froze with the whistle clamped between his teeth. He’d heard that howl—that baleful howl that defied nature itself—too many times before in his nightmares. “What was that?” he whispered.

  “Y’all …” Bess pointed out the window. Her tan skin looked pale white in the rising moonlight, and her breathing became quick and shallow. “We’re not alone.”

  A dull, dark glow shifted through the forest. The idea that a shadow could be luminous confused Lucas’s mind. He blinked and blinked again, thinking that each time he opened his eyes, the glowing shadow would fade away, like a mirage. But with each blink, he realized that it was real. The shadow moved quickly, then paused, as if it were considering where to run next. And then … it howled.

  “The beast,” Bess said in a swallowed whisper.

  “No way.” The dog whistle fell from Lucas’s mouth. He’d maybe seen the beast in Lens’s pictures. He’d maybe even seen the beast hit his mom’s car. But looking out the window from his house, Lucas never imagined that the beast could be so real. He rubbed his eyes and began to panic that he was imagining things again. Lucas grabbed his inhaler and breathed deeply. “No. There’s a perfectly normal answer here. Maybe that’s a hunter with a lantern and he’s tracking a deer. Maybe the pictures you took weren’t the beast. Have you ever stopped to consider that it might not be a monster haunting us? There’s always a good explanation for spooky legends. It’s, like, a wolverine or a skunk.”

  But as soon as he said those words, Lucas didn’t believe them. The beast emerged from a clearing and its two red eyes gazed directly at the house. For a second, Lucas thought it might even have seen him.

  “We gotta go,” said Bess.

  Lucas stood stone still. “I like that idea,” he said without moving his lips. He dared not do anything that might risk catching the beast’s attention.

  “Wow, I really didn’t think you’d see it my way,” said Bess as she climbed out the window onto the tree branch. “I thought we’d need Silas’s cameras to spot the beast, but there he is, right now. Let’s go!”

  She shimmied down the tree and landed on the ground before Lucas realized what was happening. “Wait, what?!” he gasped.

  Lens pushed past him onto the tree, too. “Come on, Lucas. We need your help.”

  “My help?” Lucas repeated. “Are you out of your minds?”

  Lens nodded and jumped from branch to branch until he was next to Bess on the ground. Then he called back up, “Okay, but good luck telling your parents what happened if we go missing, ’cause they’ll have to explain it to our parents.”

  “And to the police,” said Bess with a smile that reminded Lucas of the first time he met her—the smile that apparently said This person will chase after demonic beasts. Instantly she pulled two glow sticks out of her pocket and snapped them. A green light came to life as she handed one to Lens. “You moved here for a reason, right, Lucas?”

  Lucas leaned out the window. “Yeah, to breathe easy and stay alive. Please don’t do this,” he begged. “Can’t we play video games or Dungeons and Dragons? Normal stuff where the monsters aren’t real?”

  Instead of answering, Bess and Lens took off running, chasing after the glowing shadow. Lucas could see the beast make odd shifts. Bolting forward, then stopping. Jolting to the left, then stopping again, as if it were tracking something that Lucas couldn’t see. The heat in the room was suddenly suffocating. Wiping the sweat from his eyes, Lucas went to grab the ball he’d dropped to put back in the rolltop desk, but it was gone.

  “Where in the world … ?” Lucas mumbled, then he locked the desk. Sure, his only two friends in Hounds Hollow were going to be eaten by an unknown animal, but Lucas still didn’t want anyone else snooping around the desk. Silas had given him the key for a reason, so Lucas tucked it and the whistle into his shirt, then looked out the window. The beast was gone, but he could still see two glow sticks racing through the woods.

  “This is stupid,” Lucas told himself, but he still stepped out onto the branch. They didn’t have trees like this in the city. He kept saying “This is stupid” over and over again as he made his way down the tree slowly. Those were the only three words he was capable of stringing together. The tree bark scraped against his arms as he slid from branch to branch. Once on solid ground, Lucas raced after his friends.

  The forest was impenetrably dark under the canopy of leaves. The moon and stars above disappeared, replaced by shifting shadows that danced on top of him.

  “This is stupid,” he repeated under his breath as he ran, searching for the green glow sticks. The trees moved closer and Lucas tripped over the wild roots.

  As the dark land shifted, Lucas recognized exactly where he was heading: straight for the Sweetwater cemetery. The silhouettes of statues stood black in the clearing as the moon cast its light over the unsettling scene. Lucas slowed down and whispered for the others. “Bess? Lens?”

  Suddenly a hand reached out and yanked Lucas into the bushes. Bess covered his mouth and made her eyes so wide that he could see her pupils, like tiny islands in a sea of white.

  “Listen up, city kid,” she whispered. “When you go to the zoo, do you jump in the tiger cage and try to pet it?”

  Lucas shoved her hand away and adjusted his necklaces. “What? No, that’d be stupid.”

  “Well, so is calling out when you’ve seen the beast!” Bess said. “This isn’t a nature hike, and we’re not leaf peeping, Lucas. Staying hidden is the first rule to staying alive.”

  “But you’re the ones who jumped out of a window to chase it!” Lucas complained.

  “First of all, we didn’t jump, we climbed down a tree,” said Lens as he shuffled next to them. “Jeez, dramatic much? Second, we didn’t walk up and introduce ourselves to the beast like you almost did.”

  “The beast is gone,” said Lucas. “I saw it disappear.”

  Bess shook her head. “It always comes back.”

  Lucas shuddered. He’d seen the beast vanish into the woods. He’d assumed that the coast was clear and that he was simply going to get his friends so that he wouldn’t have to explain to his parents why they weren’t in the house anymore. But now, Lucas was in way bigger trouble.

  “What’s our plan, then?” Lucas asked. He tried on his bravest voice, but even he could hear it crack.

  Lens held up his camera and pointed to the flash. “Here’s what we know. The flash doesn’t bother the beast. He never even flinches when one goes off.”

  “We’re working on a theory that the beast can’t sense light,” said Bess.

  “Or maybe it can’t even see at all,” added Lens.

  “So what, it just roams through the forest bumping into trees?” asked Lucas. “I mean, there’s got to be an answer for what this thing is. Maybe the beast is an animal that people thought was extinct, but it’s the last of its kind and we should probably just leave it alone to live out the rest of its days in peace?”

  Bess huffed. “There’s only one way to find out.”

  Lucas was getting tired of hearing her say that. Nothing good ever came of it.r />
  They stayed low in the bushes as the moon cast a soft haze on the forest. A thick fog rolled in. Thin wisps like tendrils reached out of the trees and swirled around the graveyard statues. The air sizzled with a heat that hadn’t been there before. It reminded Lucas of the hissing radiators in his old apartment when the high temperatures swallowed him whole. It was like being caught in a furnace, but there wasn’t a single flame in sight.

  Leaning forward, Lucas peered through the bushes. A shadow moved near the woods, and the image made him hold his breath. The animal, standing on four legs, had a gray glow shining around it. The beast was more like a smudge of an animal brought to life. One look at this creature dispelled Lucas’s hopes that it was really just another legend. This beast was very, very real. Fiery red eyes darted back and forth, searching either to make sure the coast was clear or to find what was hiding in the night. Lucas silently prayed it wasn’t looking for him.

  With a quick pounce, the beast shuddered into the cemetery of statues. Watching it move made Lucas sick to his stomach. The beast walked in jarring, ragged angles. It was like looking at a broken mirror—Lucas saw one reflection from millions of shattered points of view. It gave him vertigo and car sickness all at once.

  The beast faced only one of the family plots. The statue watching over this grave was unlike the others. It wasn’t a winged angel sent down from heaven but the statue of a man in a robe surrounded by animals. A deer, a lamb, a dog, and birds—all made of stone—huddled around the character with a halo of hair chiseled around his stone head.

  “This is crazy,” Bess whispered. “The beast has never stood still!”

  Lens’s camera flashed and Lucas almost jumped out of his skin. “A little warning next time!” he hissed.

  Lens shifted closer to get more pictures. With every flash, Lucas started to see a shape beneath the pulsing dark smudge. The high-pitched whine of Lens’s camera was loud, but the beast didn’t react. Instead, it remained in the circle of graves, like an animal waiting for its owner to return.

  “I’m going in,” whispered Bess.