Darkly Rising

by J. D. Matheny

  She didn’t correct him, only nodded her head and remained quiet. She didn’t trust herself to speak at that moment.

  “Good. That’s good. I’ll make breakfast.” He rose and left the room.

  Jenny waited until his loud footsteps left the stairs and she could hear him in the kitchen before she allowed the first tear to fall. She had to do something, but what?

  Sophie set down a stainless steel, insulated coffee pitcher on the kitchen table. With it, some sugar, a carton of cream, and a shaker of cinnamon. Then she sat next to Thomas and across from James. “This is starting to feel like a club or something. Our own little secret society.” She smiled but there was little humor in it.

  “I’ve always hated clubs and secret societies,” said James. “Secret societies are a popular topic among the people that frequent my store. Chemtrails, Skull and Bones, Illuminati, Tower Seven, Nine Eleven, it’s never ending. Eventually it all leads to vast government cover-ups and the New World Order. Most people will believe in anything if you present lies to them as facts. So, leave me out of the club, I’m just here for coffee.”

  “My you’re a cynical old man,” Thomas said with a half-hearted laugh. “After everything I’ve seen, I could just about believe in anything. I mean, what are we here for? Discussing how to destroy some possessed object to make sure we prevent my nephew from turning into a monster. Ancient astronauts and fake moon landings don’t seem as far-fetched now as they once did.” He looked at Sophie. “Kai will be gone awhile?”

  “Oh, I’d imagine, he left a while ago to go work on his little building project. I didn’t watch him leave, but I don’t see any reason he would be lingering. So, what are we talking about here? Is there a plan?”

  Thomas set down his coffee and ran a hand up along his scar, the bristles of his beard sounding like sandpaper on his calloused hand. “Total annihilation, guess that’s what it comes down to. We both think that we should pursue complete destruction of that thing before we consider the alternative.”

  “Alternative?” Sophie’s eyes darted back and forth between James and her brother.

  “Whatever that may be,” James said.

  Thomas laid a hand on her forearm. “Something needs to work. We won’t cross that bridge unless we have to. I’m sure if we get rid of that blasted lantern than things will turn out just fine.”

  His soothing attempts weren’t working. Sophie looked as if she was about to get up and storm from the table. Her face reddened and her jaws clenched. “Kai might seem a little creepy sometimes. I know there’s been the occasional strange occurrence, and I agree that it’s a good idea to get rid of the fucking lantern, just in case, but what else are we talking about here? You act like if we don’t do something my son is going to turn into Jack the Ripper!”

  “Sis, please. Nobody is suggesting we do anything drastic. Kai is a good kid, I agree with everything you’re saying. We’re only talking precautions here, OK?” He waited for her to calm, which she did only slightly. “You and Kai are the only family I have left. I would never hurt either of you.”

  Unless I had to, was his unfinished thought.

  That seemed to work. She wrapped both hands around her mug of coffee and held it to her forehead. “I’m sorry. This whole thing gets me upset. Sometimes I wonder whether I should be fearing my own child, then I think I’m crazy and a horrible mom for having the thought. Let’s just focus on the lantern. We all agree that getting rid of that thing is a good idea. So how do we do it?”

  “Leave that to me,” said James. “I have a buddy who has a metal furnace in his shop. Uses it to melt down copper and such. It’ll make quick work of a lantern. Might have to crunch it down to fit, but your brother has that part down. We smash it up a bit, toss it in the furnace, and turn the sucker to liquid. If there are any entities possessing the lantern, it’ll be sealed up tight. It can shriek and wail, make a little light show, whatever it wants to do inside the furnace, won’t matter much to us.”

  “Then we take a trip to the coast,” Thomas said, jumping in. “We’ll go out on a boat and dump the thing in the ocean. If all that doesn’t work, then I don’t know what will.”

  Sophie just shook her head and rubbed her face. “I feel like we’re teenagers playing with a Ouija board. We’ve gotten spooked and now we’re acting like there’s boogeymen in the shadows.”

  “We’ve seen the boogeyman, sis. It’s been seventeen years, but I’d wager if you close your eyes right now you can see him again like it was yesterday.”

  Sophie stared at her brother for a moment, her little jest now blown to the wind. He was right, she saw Daucina’s face clearly. It was something she needed to exorcise from her thoughts, and maybe destroying the lantern would do that.

  “Well, let’s get the ball rolling then.” She stood and walked out on the back patio to retrieve the cursed object from its box. The thought of bringing it into the house again was unbearable, so out there it had stayed.

  But when she bent to pick up the box, it was light as a feather.

  “Oh no,” she said. “Please.”

  She popped the box flaps open and looked inside, seeing nothing more than empty shadow.

  Kai spent the next couple of hours watching with more than a little excitement the final stages of his current building project being completed. There would still be more work to do eventually, but for now, having four walls and a roof was enough to satisfy him. From the look of things, the roof would be done today or tomorrow. The crew was erecting long two by sixes up as he looked on. Once the framing was complete, they would sheet it and roll on the wood thatching. A couple of the boys were walking around the foundation with shovels, backfilling the exterior and smoothing the grade.

  Things really couldn’t be going much better. In time, he’d push Sophie for some more cash to put a floor on the interior and purchase a makeshift sarcophagus or altar of some type. She wouldn’t know that’s where her money was going, though. Not at first.

  After a time, he got restless and decided to stretch his legs with a long walk. He set off up an incline to the North, meaning to get a good look from an elevated position before heading West, where he would run into the main road that would lead him back home. As much as he enjoyed being out here, he had an appointment to be ready for tonight, and he was very much looking forward to it.

  He walked up the hill, and as he reached the peak, looked back down on his place. He wanted to remember how it looked now, at the beginning stages before all the changes that would occur. The temple looked so perfect, despite being out of place in its surroundings. The water curved around it, the land spread out to either side, trees lined the corridor where it was situated. It was like a postcard scenario, and it was all his. Someday it would be vastly different. Once his people grew, and with it, his power. Pine trees would give way to palms and the spattering of yellow wildflowers would make way for the vibrant red of hibiscus. No more chilly winters either. This place would remain temperate and warm, given enough time.

  That would only be the start. He’d seen it.

  With a smile on his dark face, he continued his walk, following the indents of the tire tracks made by the trucks his helpers had driven in. Eventually, when the trees thinned out a bit, he turned to his left and moved through the forest. He knew right where he was, having walked this land so often before. It took fifteen minutes before the roar of engines could be heard zipping by, and another ten before the trees opened up to a wide shoulder off the two-lane blacktop. He took another left and headed back South toward home.

  As he neared the familiar stretch where his driveway connected, he noticed that shiny newer Dodge pickup pulled up alongside Ms. Garret’s home again. He wondered if the ex-cop would be looking out for him again.

  Instead of taking a left down his driveway, Kai crossed over to the other side of the road and approached the little house. The idea of a confrontation was too sweet to resist. Maybe he’d ask about little Ralphie, or inquire of Ms. Garret as t
o whether she’d found a replacement for him yet. That ought to be good for some fireworks.

  As he approached the front gate to Ms. Garret’s yard, he could see that her disappointment of a son had stayed true to his word about upkeep. The grass looked freshly mowed, which was probably the last time it would need cut until spring, and the raking was done. Everything looked clean and tidy.

  Nobody came out to greet him.

  “Knock, knock! Anybody home?” He did his best to look through the windows from outside the fence, but the white lace curtains were drawn. Despite the truck being here, the house had a look of lifelessness about it. There were no lights on and no sounds that he could detect. Just as he decided that he’d have to rile Ms. Garret up another time, the front door swung open, revealing the silhouette of a figure cloaked in the dark interior of the home.

  “The golden boy returns.” Ms. Garret’s son walked forward, revealing a picture of a man that had undergone some radical changes. The close shaved hair on his head had grown out, still short but still managing to look in disarray, and the hair on his face was even longer, and shaggy looking at best. His eyes no longer had the sharp look of a man who saw every detail. Now they were sunken and haunted looking. His clothes were all black, pants and long-sleeved shirt both, and he held his arms crossed tightly in front of his chest as stepped out on the front porch.

  “Golden boy, Officer Garret?”

  “Oh, you can drop the officer stuff, kiddo. I’m no longer an officer, far from it, to be honest. The name is Randall.” He took another step forward and gazed up at a partly cloudy sky as if he hadn’t seen it for days. “Golden boy, indeed. That’s how my mother talked of you, at least to me. You’re surprised to hear it, huh? Yeah, so was I. That changed though after the fleabag disappeared. You weren’t so golden then.”

  Kai was actually feeling caught somewhat off-guard, which didn’t suit him very well. He recovered quickly. “She certainly didn’t treat me like a golden boy. I’d guess if she spoke that way about me to you, it was just to rankle you.”

  Randall paused to consider that a moment. “I suppose you could be right. She wasn’t exactly a saint of a woman. Could be a real bitch, if I’m honest.”

  “Could be?” Kai tilted his head to the said to get a look through the doorway, but he couldn’t see much of the interior of the home from where he stood.

  “Oh, I guess she’s changed her way. A bit less inclined to offer up her cutting remarks now. I gotta say, after over forty years of that mouth, it’s kind of nice to have a bit of peace and quiet. Why don’t you come in and say hello?” He stepped to the side to give Kai room to pass by.

  Kai couldn’t resist. Had the ex-cop actually done something to his old lady? Wouldn’t break his heart, but it would certainly throw him for a loop. He walked through the gate and up through the door, pausing only long enough to get a closer look at the mess of a man before him.

  I’ll be damned, he thought, he finally stood up for himself.

  The house was small, and felt smaller with the walls painted grey as they were, but he supposed that fit the old woman’s personality. Oak flooring ran through the whole of the house as far as he could see. There was a small green couch and a black recliner in the front room, along with several porcelain figurines of dopey little dogs placed about the room. There was no television, but on one end of the room was a small table with a half-finished puzzle set up on it.

  “Around to your right. She’s waiting in the kitchen.”

  Kai smiled and shook his head. There was a strong sense of where this was going, and he enjoyed playing along with the game, seeing as how the deck was stacked in his favor. He moved to the end of the room, where there was an open doorway on the right that opened into an antique looking kitchen. It wasn’t the old green appliances that caught his attention though.

  One of the dining chairs, of which there were only two, was lying on its back in the middle of the kitchen floor, and lying beyond that was old Ironside herself. She didn’t look so smug and self-assured now, far from it. Rather, her tongue lolled out of the side of her mouth, giving her a similar appearance as the dog she had once so loved. The left side of her face was swollen and the color of a plum, while blood had run down her face from a gash above the left eye and pooled up on the wood floor. It all looked like it must have been very painful, but it wasn’t the blow to the head that must have killed her. It was the deep bruising around the neck that was where she must have met her end. Kai suspected that the damage to the face is what had sent her to the floor.

  “I always did want to smack her around a bit. If just to show her I was a man after all. She never believed that. Always talked to me as if I were a dim-witted kid. Did the same with my old man, and you see how that ended up. Didn’t really mean to kill her, though. She just wouldn’t shut up about things. Wouldn’t stop with her degrading little comments. Telling me I’ll never find a woman to give her grandkids now. ‘You’re too old’, she said. ‘Probably can’t even get it up anymore,’ she said.” Then shouted down at the body. “Well I can, ma! Got it up good and hard when I was choking the life out of you!” The words were spat out laced with venom, but there was also a water springing up in the man’s eyes.

  Kai just stood where he was, staring at the bruises. He was envious of Randall Garret. Randall’s handiwork was right there for him to admire. Kai’s only handiwork to date had been locked in a spaceship and he’d never thought to open it and see what a vanquished enemy looked like after he’d been boiled alive.

  “Really, though, it was that fucking little dog that I wanted. A boy shouldn’t hurt his mother. That was wrong. I lost control. But the dog, she loved that little bastard more than she loved her own son. I looked forward to silencing that mutt.” He paused only for a moment, long enough for his speech to transition from an abstract confession to a menacing threat. “I got the feeling she liked the golden boy more than me, too. The way she’d flaunt you in my face. Always taking care of her yard, cleaning her gutters, how you were so tall and handsome. No problem getting women for you, that’s what she threw in my face.”

  Finally, Kai turned back toward the man, who now had his arms uncrossed, twisting a long-bladed knife slowly in his hand. He took a large enough step forward to bring himself within striking distance, but not too close. It wasn’t his intention to present a threat, only to make sure the man could get a good look at him. Bending forward, he stared into Randall’s eyes. Those eyes trumpeted anger, but there was something else there, as well. Fear and anguish.

  “It’s sad that she didn’t express to you how she really felt.” Kai let his face drop, his shook in slow denial. “All she really wanted was to have her son home again, close to her, where she could be a part of his life.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “The way she spoke of you, it almost made me doubt the love my own mother felt for me. I’ve never heard my mom speak of me like that. You practically held up the sky, for all she told me.” He stared intently at the man, but his black eyes were soft and inviting. They held the promise of unspoken words and hidden truths.

  “No. No, no, no, you’ve got it wrong. She never passed up an opportunity to belittle me. Or my father. We were just mules meant for heavy lifting in her eyes. She never failed to let me know.”

  Kai remained silent for a moment. Randall’s eyes had gone to his mother now, lying cold and finally silent on the hard kitchen floor. He let the man stew on his words, let the doubt sink in, then he began to feed it more.

  “I really respected your mother. She was smart and strong. I wanted to earn her respect, but I never cared for the way she used me.”

  Randall’s eyes dragged off his mother’s body and back to Kai. “She was smart, and strong, and she didn’t use people.” The words came out in defense.

  “I’m sorry, Randall, I don’t mean any disrespect, but I knew what was happening. All she ever told me was how I was doing things wrong, or how I was going to screw something
up. I was only trying to help.” He let himself sound pleading now, as if it were his own fault for not pleasing the old lady. Even though his story was fictitious. “It’s not my fault I wasn’t as good as you, is it? She always told me that one day her boy would come back home, and things would get done right around here. Now I see what was happening. I was just a lure, wasn’t I? To get you back home to take care of her?”

  “You . . . you think that’s true?”

  “Oh, I think it’s obvious.” He stepped forward again, a half-step only, but easily now within range of the knife. There was no fear, however. There was only the need to look deep into those fractured blue eyes. He was seeing things there, more clearly than he’d ever seen into another person before. “There were others, weren’t there Randall? Other old ladies, other obnoxious little dogs? You took care of them. Showed those women you were a man. Silenced their fleabag mutts.”

  Randall only stared back at him now, his eyes mostly vacant and the blade dangling from a loosened grip. The former cop, not so long ago a clean-cut and intimidating figure, now looked like a vagabond who was broken from a lifetime of cruelty and remorse. He stared into Kai’s eyes as if there were a life raft in there somewhere. Something he could grab hold of to keep from sinking any further.

  “Those might have deserved it. I don’t know. What I do know is their own sons weren’t there to protect them, and that’s what a good son does, isn’t it? Protect his mother?”

  “Sons shouldn’t hurt their mothers,” the voice droned out in response.

  “No,” replied Kai, “they shouldn’t. Especially when their mothers love them so dearly. When all their mother wanted was for them to come home. To take care of things.”

  “Oh my god,” the voice croaked out. “What have I done? I didn’t mean to. I just wanted to earn her respect. I went a little overboard, that’s all.”