The Haunting of Hounds Hollow

by Jeffrey Salane

  Lucas held up the book to show them a picture of a black cat silhouetted on a fence with the moon behind it. “The concept is most linked to witchcraft. You’ve heard of a witch’s pet cat? That’s a familiar. They aren’t ghosts or monsters; they’re more like demons. They live because they are linked to something unnatural. So, technically, Bess is right—the dogs aren’t ghosts. But that doesn’t explain how you knew they weren’t ghosts, Bess. Or why you keep insisting these rocks will work against the beast.”

  All eyes were on Bess. She crossed her arms and tucked her legs under herself on the couch. “I’d rather not talk about this in front of any adults.”

  Eartha leaned forward and pointed at Bess. “And I’d rather you not put your filthy shoes on my couch. Now you best start talking before I call your mother and tell her what you’ve been up to these past few months.”

  Bess shifted her legs immediately and sat upright. She stared at the blank wall across the room, and her gaze went glassy. “I was in the forest, months before Silas died, and I saw him. He was with the beast. I couldn’t tell what was going on, but he was lying on the ground and the beast had just bitten him or something. I said I’d get help, but he told me to stay put or the beast might chase me down, too.

  “The beast paced circles around the two of us. When it got bored, it ran off. I helped Silas get home and he told me the story. After the fire, his family rebuilt the house. The dogs were gone, but Silas started noticing odd things in the home. Dirt in his bedsheets when he woke up, hearing clicks on the hardwood floors, or scratching coming from the other side of the wall. He thought he was going crazy.”

  Only it wasn’t crazy to Lucas. Bess had just described what he’d experienced in Sweetwater Manor. He shuddered thinking about the dirt in his bed or the scratching snarls from the walled-up room—a place where ghostly paw prints had led him.

  “Then, one day,” continued Bess, “his dog Scout appeared. Silas was visiting his brother’s grave, and the dog just trotted out of the woods like he was back from some big adventure. But that wasn’t the only thing to come out of the woods.”

  “The other dogs followed, too, right?” Lens guessed.

  “No.” Bess paused, but she kept looking straight ahead, as if she were boring a hole into the past and focusing on what Silas told her back then. “No, just two. Scout and Shadow. They were the only dogs at first. Then slowly, more appeared. And each time a dog came back, Silas told me his heart broke a little more.”

  “Why wasn’t he happy?” asked Lucas. “I mean, his dogs came back.”

  Bess pulled out of her thousand-yard stare and looked at him. “The dogs came back, but they came back different. He couldn’t control them. They were wild. He feared for the town and everyone in it. That’s why he bought up so much property around here and put up cameras.”

  “He wasn’t scared of what was outside the house getting in,” said Lucas. “He was scared of what was inside the house getting out.”

  Bess nodded. “There’s more. And it’s not gonna be easy to hear. In fact, it’s the one part of Silas’s story that made me think he was a complete lunatic. I pretended to listen then, but now … I think he was telling the truth.”

  Lucas turned and the bags of ice shifted off his shoulders, landing on his knees with a slushy thwack. “What did he tell you, Bess?”

  She took a deep breath. “His dogs weren’t the only things that came back after the fire. His brother, Abel, did, too.”

  Lucas felt a chill, and it wasn’t from the ice packs this time.

  Bess reached into her pocket and pulled out another stone like the one that had short-circuited the beast. She rubbed it in her palm. “Silas found Abel in the house. He was a boy, the same age as when he … passed on. This new Abel, he never talked. Never said a word. Silas told me that Abel didn’t have to explain why he was there.”

  “Why?” asked Lens.

  “I don’t know,” said Bess. “He didn’t tell me. But Silas did say that Abel was always scared around the dogs. Avoided them to the point that Abel kind of disappeared from Silas’s life all over again. You asked me about the rocks earlier. They are from the border around Abel’s grave. Silas told me that they would scare the dogs off, but they would also stop them if they ever needed to be … stopped.” The last word barely made it out of her mouth.

  Lucas frowned and clenched his fists. “I also asked you about the boy in the house on my first day here. You lied. You acted like I was crazy.”

  “Sure, like I was supposed to say, ‘Howdy, neighbor, you know that kid you saw? He’s a ghost!’” Bess threw her arms up and let them flap back down. “Besides, I needed to get into the house, and you were my way in.”

  She gasped as soon as she said the last words and went quiet.

  Lucas raised his eyebrows. “Why did you need to get in the house?”

  “To find my dad, okay?” Bess’s voice wavered as she closed her eyes and steadied her breathing. “See, I have my own theory about the dogs. A few years back, I lost my father. You probably all know. The whole town knows, but no one wants to talk about it. He didn’t die, he just disappeared. In a normal town, I’d just think what everyone else thinks. Deadbeat dad runs away from his family. But my dad wasn’t a deadbeat, and our town isn’t normal. There’s a lot of folks disappearing in Hounds Hollow.”

  “So you think the beast ate everyone?” Lens seemed horrified at the thought.

  “No. I’m saying that there’s something magnetic about those dogs.” Bess tapped her chest over her heart. “I feel it here every time I see them. I know you feel it, too, Lucas.”

  Suddenly the missing persons board crowded with photographs crashed into the mysterious room full of workers. The pieces fell into place for Lucas. The missing people had been in front of him the whole time and he’d never thought twice about it. “The workers,” Lucas whispered. “Eartha … the workers?”

  Eartha shifted uncomfortably in her chair. She stood up and moved into the kitchen. The light from the morning was spreading over the forest, chasing away the dark blue cover of night. Birds were waking up and the cicadas’ buzz rose.

  “That’s the thing about lonely Silas and his giant house,” said Bess as she curled back up and put her feet on the sofa. This time Eartha didn’t scold her. “It takes a lot of workers to build such a detailed place. I’ve never seen a single truck parked outside. I’ve never even seen a single worker leave at night.”

  “Dude … no, dude.” Lens tried to express his feelings, but the words escaped him.

  Eartha made the sign of the cross as Lucas gently took the rock Bess had given him out of his pocket. Holding it, Lucas felt connected to this strange, new world. It was smooth, edgeless, cold, and hard. Lucas squeezed it tight.

  “Eartha, it’s all true, isn’t it?” he asked.

  The old woman gazed out the sink window toward Sweetwater Manor. She stood with her arms braced against the counter and flipped on the faucet. Water rumbled against the empty metallic basin as Eartha grabbed soap and scrubbed her hands. “Silas never wanted to hurt anybody,” she mumbled. Her voice was as distant as her stare. “I had my orders. I took care of the house. I took care of the dogs.”

  Lens shook his head and whispered to Lucas. “I think we broke her.”

  Ignoring Eartha, Lucas opened the Haunted History book again. “There’s got to be a way to stop this.”

  “Maybe we could wake up the workers,” suggested Lens.

  “No,” Lucas said. “They won’t listen to us. The spell is too strong.”

  Lens started pacing. “Then we tell the police. This has gotten too dangerous.”

  Lucas shook his head. “What happens when the dogs put a curse on the police, too? Or worse? Eartha said it—a scared animal will do anything to protect itself.”

  “Well, do you have any other bright ideas?” Bess punched the couch cushion, then jumped up and pointed to Eartha. “’Cause we’re going to turn into that if we don’t do something.”<
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  Lucas flipped back to the book. “Maybe. According to this, familiars work for a higher mystical power, but in rare cases, familiars become linked to other spirits. And in those cases, the two powers essentially trap each other.”

  “Um, in English this time,” said Lens.

  “Abel Sweetwater and the dogs are connected,” Lucas answered. “They are tied together, like familiars. They are each other’s familiars. Lost souls bonded by horrible events.”

  “Um, dude, how is that going to help us?” asked Lens.

  Lucas’s eyes went wide. “Abel’s hiding. The dogs are hunting. Maybe the dogs have been looking for him all this time? If we can bring the dogs to him, maybe the curse will end.”

  “Lucas, you said maybe like a million times,” said Bess. “Do you really think the familiars will cancel each other out? Is that, like, basic familiar math?”

  Thoughts raced through Lucas’s mind. “I don’t know, but I think it’s worth a try. You said Abel disappeared from Silas’s life, but I don’t think he went far. In fact, I think I know exactly where he might be hiding. Are you guys up for another adventure?”

  Lens peeked at the clock. “My parents know I’m up early every morning over at Bolt’s stall. I’m good to go until the barbecue, but if I miss that, I’m toast. Who else is going to take pictures for the paper?” He held up his camera.

  Bess walked over to the kitchen and turned off the faucet. Then she dried Eartha’s hands with a towel and guided her back to the oversized chair. As Eartha sat down, the old woman smiled at Bess for a moment, then closed her eyes and started humming a slow melody.

  “My mom gets like this sometimes,” Bess said. “Just freezes in the middle of doing dishes and goes all … glitchy. If finding Abel can bring back my dad, then I’m in.”

  Lucas pulled out his inhaler and drew in a deep breath. “Okay. Let’s go save this place.”

  Without the mustard paw prints leading the way, Lucas thought they would have a hard time finding the walled-in room. But with Casper, Dakota, and Duke by their sides, the pack moved swiftly.

  As they passed doors with bones etched on the knobs, Lens pointed them out.

  “So these are all trapdoors?” asked Lens.

  “I think Silas installed them to keep the dogs and Abel confused and lost,” said Lucas.

  Bess was at the rear of the group, walking backward in case anything followed them. Every step awoke a new creak or moan in the old floorboards of the house.

  “Are we close?” she asked.

  Dakota barked softly.

  “Sounds like it’s around here,” said Lucas. All at once the long night hit him. His eyes were heavy, his arms throbbed, and his whole body felt like it needed to hibernate for twenty straight hours. Without realizing it, Lucas had stopped dead in the middle of the hallway.

  Casper turned and trotted back to Lucas, wagging his tail happily. In a strange way, seeing the white mutt was like wearing the CPAP machine. Breathing became easier. The sleepiness drained away and Lucas ran on.

  When the dogs finally stopped, they each put their front paws on a wall with thick, carpet-like wallpaper. It was an ugly shade of green that only succeeded in making the hallway darker than it should be.

  “I thought the wall was supposed to be unfinished,” said Bess.

  Lucas ran his hands over the wallpaper, moving all the way to the corner edge where the next hallway turned. The decorated walls extended down that way, too. Then Lucas found it—the crease in the wallpaper. Slipping his fingers under, he tugged at the strip, and it yanked away from the drywall.

  “Looks like someone finished it,” said Lucas. “Here, help me. Let’s clear this ugly green fuzz off the wall.”

  Lens and Bess each searched for a seam and tore into the wallpaper. It was so fresh that the strips came down easily. When they were done, the dogs inspected the blank wall. Casper spun in circles and began to bark loudly. Each sharp snap made Lens and Bess nervously search for the other dogs in the pack, but Lucas understood what Casper meant.

  “We need to go through this wall.”

  Bess nodded, but Lens wasn’t sure. “Or we could leave the wall just as it was built. What if it’s a load-bearing wall? Besides, we don’t have sledgehammers. How are we going to knock down a—”

  But before he could finish, Lucas kicked the wall. His leg pushed through all the way up to his thigh and got stuck. He stumbled, but then regained his balance. Pulling his leg out, Lucas kicked the wall again. Bess joined him this time, as the drywall turned her black sneakers white.

  Once the hole was wide enough, Lucas and Bess cleared the rest with their hands. A black opening sat before them. It looked dangerous and magical at the same time. Lucas stepped inside first.

  Bess had one leg in before she stopped. “You coming, Lens? Or are you going to stay outside and wait for the rest of the pack?”

  The three dogs gazed quizzically up at Lens. “You know, I used to be a dog person, but cats are starting to look really awesome. I’m coming with you.”

  The room smelled like rotten eggs and smoke. It made everyone gag at first. Lucas found the light switch on the wall and clicked it on. The small room was filled with framed photos, news clippings, and documents. They covered nearly every square inch of the room like wallpaper. Against the back wall, there was a small brown cot with a blanket draped over it so that the bed almost looked like it was floating. Next to the cot, a wooden chair and desk sat lonely and curious.

  “Someone lived in here,” said Lucas.

  “Not just someone,” said Lens, pointing to a picture on the wall. “I think it was Abel.”

  While Bess studied the photo, Lucas walked deeper into the room, wondering what it must have been like to live there. He sat down on the cot and felt the mattress sag under his weight. The blanket was stiff and rough to the touch, coarse like old wool. From the bed, Lucas had a good view of the hole in the wall.

  “Do you guys notice anything missing from this room?” he asked.

  “Like the past eighty years?” said Lens.

  “Windows,” said Bess. “There aren’t any windows in this room. Just walls covered with family pictures.”

  “That’s strange, right?” Lucas moved over to the desk. Pulling the lone top drawer toward him, he found a journal inside that looked a lot like the Hound Pound journal. He opened it. The first few pages were filled with what looked like a first grader’s handwriting. All the words were either spelled wrong or spelled phonetically, but as the pages progressed, the style of handwriting matured, too. Papers on US history and book reports gave way to longer passages that read more like a diary:

  The sun was hot today, and Mother told me that I needed to stay indoors, lest I burn. But the dogs needed their walk and Silas had to help Father, so when Mother wasn’t looking, I snuck out. The dogs are getting strong. I almost dropped the leash many times. I took the dogs through the woods and into town. I like it there. Watching the other people almost makes me feel normal. The people in town are nice to each other, but they are not so nice to me. Silas says I scare them. When I ask him why I scare them, he says it’s because people are dumbbells. The dogs are never scared of me. Shadow sleeps with me every night. Mother was mad that I went out today. She’s worried about my health. I am tired from all the sun, but it was worth the trip.

  The journal ended there. Lucas flipped backward, reading earlier entries. Each one told the same story. Abel was lonely. Outside of his dogs and his family, he felt unwanted by the world.

  Lucas closed the book slowly. This journal was from a different world. These were Abel’s final, private thoughts, written in a windowless room, hidden away from other people. But Lucas had lived this life, too. Abel’s room reminded Lucas of the doctor’s offices he visited year after year. He thought of how happy he’d been riding the bike Bess gave him just a few days ago. Lucas suddenly found himself relating to Abel in a way he never expected. One thing that doesn’t change from the past to the future:
It sucks to be sick.

  With a nervous jolt, Lucas stood up and tried to shake off his thoughts. He needed to keep a clear mind. This room must have survived the fire, but it had been hidden for a reason, and they needed to find out why.

  Suddenly a low growl curled from under the bed.

  “Please tell me that was one of our dogs,” said Bess. But the trio of pups stood in the makeshift doorway with their tails low.

  The blanket over the cot billowed out as the growling grew louder. A rush of intense heat blasted through the small room with such a force that the picture frames cracked and shattered into tiny bits, covering the kids in flecks of glass. A black paw reached out from under the cot and scraped against the wood floor.

  “Run!” screamed Lucas. But it was too late.

  A dark, shaggy dog pounced from its hiding place, knocking Lens and Bess aside as it landed on Lucas. Shoving its nose in his face, the animal sniffed him all over. Wet drippings from its snout fell onto Lucas’s face. His heart beat uncontrollably, but Lucas kept as still as possible. A sneer lifted on the dog’s lips, revealing gleaming white teeth, sharp and ready to tear into something. A pair of black eyes stared curiously at the scar on Lucas’s chest, then at the others in the room.

  “Shadow,” Lucas whispered, and the dog huffed and snorted as if the earthly name no longer applied to the black husky.

  Powerful paws dug into Lucas’s shoulders and legs as Shadow loomed over him. Lucas had never seen an animal this big, much less been tackled by one. Shadow was twice the size of the beast. The husky leaned closer and licked the dog whistle that still hung around Lucas’s neck. Shadow’s bright pink tongue glowed against its dark fur as the dog snapped at the whistle.