“You can tell that?”
“Without a doubt.” Violina leaned toward her and whispered. “I can help…encourage things along, if you like.”
Maisie had to chase away her teen-girl grin.
“It’s not cheating, you know,” Violina persisted. “He’s single, I hear.”
“Thank you, but I sort of like the way it’s progressing.” Maisie’s expression showed distrust.
“Oh, I did it again, didn’t I? Overstepped.”
Maisie stayed quiet.
“This tension between Ysabella and me…it must be stressful for you,” offered Violina. “I don’t want you to think I would ever hurt or undermine her. I love her, just like you do.” Violina made a show of arcing the sage over the organ. “On the contrary, I’m afraid she’s overextending herself. I’m worried about her health.”
“She just needs a day or two to recover. The whole thing with the werewolf girl. God, it was stressful.”
“She’s stronger than any of us,” Violina responded. “But she takes on too much. She’s not good at delegating.”
“What can we do to help her?” Maisie asked.
It was time to coax the rabbit further into the trap.
“Let me give it some thought.” Violina exhibited an earnest expression, lowering her voice. “It’s critical that we protect her at all costs. Even…if it’s against her wishes, I’m afraid.”
* * * *
Strength in numbers did not offer Reverend McGlazer the comfort promised by scripture. If anything, it only made him more leery of potential trouble. “You should have brought your spotlights, deputies.”
“We left them in the hunter’s blind,” explained Hudson. “Had to move fast when we were transporting our furry friend.”
McGlazer unlocked the heavy-duty padlock on the equipment-shed door. Reminding himself that the phantasmic fungus was gone and it was okay to breathe, he eased the simple plywood door open. The punkers, the witches, the two boys and the lawmen all warily stepped back from it with him.
Ysabella went first, hoping the darkness of the stairwell hid her need to steady herself against the wall.
Soon, they all stood in the basement’s first room, waiting while McGlazer took the ancient candle lamp down from the door-side sconce and lit it.
“This is where you want to record your album?” Maisie asked Pedro.
“Our demo,” he corrected. “The studio guys will decide about the album.”
Dennis whistled a few notes and listened to their echoes. “So far, so good.”
“What if I get scared?” teased Jill.
“Don’t start!” from Stuart.
“I feel the residue of the malevolence that was here,” said Ysabella. “But it has gone.”
“Gone where?” Stella asked.
It was almost a minute before Ysabella, sliding her hand along the wall, stopped and faced her. “Somewhere in the ether.”
“Somewhere in time,” enjoined Maisie.
Ysabella went to the arched door at the far left from the entryway. “Beyond here, spirits once waited,” she said. “But no longer.”
They all watched her peer at the doorway in the dark, until Violina spoke. “Shall we cleanse it too, then?”
“Not now,” said Ysabella. She looked at Maisie. “Years ago.”
* * * *
The catacombs expedition party resurfaced to a bright sun reflecting off the yellow leaves of the nearby maple. A mantle of relief settled over veterans of the horror show it had once hosted.
“Not nearly as creepy as I remember it,” said DeShaun.
“I definitely prefer its current non-mushroom-freak state,” said Stuart, “and it looks like the rev is gonna let us work on the demo down there.”
He yanked a thumb back at the happy trio of punkers exchanging fist bumps. Dennis and Jill even hugged, only to have Pedro get between them like a boxing referee.
“What about your dad?” Stuart asked.
“He’s okay, but he’s been awful hush-hush since the woods.” DeShaun cast an inconspicuous glance at Yoshida. “And Yoshi’s acting kinda weird, don’t you think?”
* * * *
With everyone distracted and Violina finally in front of her, Ysabella held onto Maisie’s arm. The girl slowed her pace and clutched Ysabella’s hand. “Should we stop for a moment?”
“No,” answered Ysabella. “Just help me look strong.”
Violina overheard but said nothing. She was well aware of Ysabella’s weakened condition. For months, she had been working to manifest it. “Boys?” she called, gesturing at Maisie to join her. “How would you like to have high tea with a couple of witches?”
The teens needed only a second of deliberation. “Make it milkshakes and you got a deal, lady.”
Chapter 11
Before The Nightmare
“The religious freedom thing was touchy as all get out,” DeShaun began, as their waitress breezed away. “Bennington had traveled the world and learned about all different religions.”
“Somewhere along the way, Benny found connections between a bunch of ’em,” said Stuart. “He settled on the idea that most so-called religions were really just the same thing with different names.”
“That’s where you get the Saturn connection. Our boy knew it wouldn’t be an easy sell. He had to feel out his candidates to make sure they would at least accept his idea, if not necessarily toe the line on it.”
“The way the math adds up, Conal got wind of Bennington’s plan and tagged along on the trip to escape getting caught for a whole grocery list of nefarious deeds he had committed.” Stuart frowned. “Not a good dude.”
“What else can you tell us about Conal O’Herlihy?” asked Maisie.
“Conal was a butthole,” said DeShaun. “He got on Bennington’s good side, then came up with a cockamamie plan to take control of the whole deal.”
“Told his crew the Lord was on their side,” added Stuart. “But we’re not so sure he was a bible believer either.”
“Remember that mushroom we were talking about?” DeShaun explained about the hallucinogenic fungus from the Greek isle of Patmos that had been the main ingredient in murderous zealot Ragdoll Ruth’s poisoned candy.
Stuart picked up the narrative. “He and his crew started digging a cave under the church foundation, to grow the stuff and—get this—preserve their own bodies for resurrection.”
Violina gazed like a predator hungry for more.
“Yep. Pretty crazy.” The boys told the tale of the mushroom men they had encountered the year before.
“Back to way-back-when,” Stuart said, “Conal organized his coup.” Having only ever read the word and not heard it, Stuart pronounced it “coop.”
“Was he successful?”
“Yes and no,” DeShaun said. “There’s not much in the archives. It gets murky.”
“But here’s what’s key,” Stuart said. “The church is called Saint Saturn’s. And this is Cronus County.”
“My guess is, the factions eventually split. But what became of Conal and pals, nobody really knows.”
“Physically, anyway,” added DeShaun. “We’re pretty sure it was his ghost that possessed Reverend McGlazer last Halloween—and his crew that wore the mushroom suits last year.”
“You dear children,” muttered Maisie. “You’ve seen and been through so much.”
“Yeah, well, if you can help our town…” DeShaun began.
“It’ll all be worth it,” finished Stuart.
* * * *
Settlement era
By the time Friedrich Schroeder had driven his horse to the settlement’s dusty main street, he’d had considerable time to regain the composure that bled from him like Hezekiah’s blood when he found the poor man’s corpse in place of his bootzaman minutes earlier. A measure of hi
s special wine helped, of course. He slowed his horse as he pondered the circumstances of making a hysterical announcement to the entire settlement.
One of their own, slain and posed in such sadistic mockery, was certainly a matter of grave concern. But did it warrant the reaction it would cause?
Other questions came to him as he and the horse trotted, then ambled their way toward town.
Could the Tsalagi—or Cherokee, as many had taken to calling them—have learned about the enslavement of their young men? It seemed they would simply have come in the night with torches and arrows and burned as many homesteads as they could rather than killing one man and posing him in such a bizarre state.
Was it a warning from one of the other settlers? If so, was it meant for him specifically? Or for others in Conal O’Herlihy’s growing contingent?
In any case, galloping into the middle of the settlement and screaming bloody murder, imploring all who would to follow him back to the horrific scene, would not do. At worst, he could find himself accused.
Schroeder steered his horse toward O’Herlihy’s home on the big hill at the end of the settlement, wishing, for a mile, he had brought something to offer the Irishman to smooth things after Schroeder’s failure to attend the previous night’s meeting.
The only vice of any kind the Celt indulged in these days was the spotted mushroom he secretly grew beneath his house. Perhaps, with this show of loyalty, Conal would offer him another chance to ingest the life-changing fungus today.
After these months of refusing it, was he ready? If it would chase away the horror of seeing Hezekiah bled and crucified, the answer was yes.
* * * *
Schroeder took his place between two large men—Gregor Tiernan and Jonas Cooke, son of the town’s constable, Adonijah—and issued a candlelit smile that the other settlers did not see. Eyes closed, they stood in a sort of trance.
The subterranean room was crowded now, where there had been only Schroeder and two others for the first gathering some years back.
Conal O’Herlihy presided at the far wall of the dank room, near the arched doorway that led to a kind of purgatory. The Irishman stood with his head bowed and his hands clasped, waiting.
Though he was late in arriving for the clandestine meeting, Schroeder knew what was happening even before hearing the panicked pounding on the arched door behind Conal.
Conal ignored this, raising his hands and head toward the low wood ceiling in supplication. “O Lord Jehovah, God of earth and altar, we praise Thee and thank Thee, on behalf of these, Your beloved sons, who now find wisdom in terror, salvation in suffering.”
Muffled voices cried for help—or the relief of death—on the other side of the door.
The other men in the room called “Amen!” in robust harmony.
Schroeder knew the door was sturdy. But even in mere candlelight, the dust bursting from its cracks and the sound of desperate assault against it raised alarm.
“Let us out!” was the staggered chorus. “It…it’s rearranging us!” one martyr clumsily explained.
Unlike the others present, Schroeder had pledged loyalty to Conal and his cause, even without experiencing the fungus-catalyzed visions. His curiosity was strong, his desire for spiritual enlightenment stronger, but his fear of going mad was strongest of all.
As a result, he often felt alone amid the other disciples, who seemed to view the trial-by-terror as simply a giant leap toward God.
When the cries and bellows began to wane, Conal nodded for help from Jonas and three other large devotees and opened the arched door to accept the saucer-eyed trippers in firm, reassuring embraces. They were eased to the masoned floor, where they all sat and wept or stuttered.
Conal knelt to put fatherly hands around the face of the nearest: Kemlin Farrady. “What did you see, brother?”
“The cock crowed! Its hens all fell dead!” Farrady gripped Conal’s wrists. “Their eggs broke open and bled smoke!”
Farrady tried to stand. O’Herlihy wouldn’t let him. “And then?”
“The smoke rained burning semen!” Farrady cried. “It spread like moss…it melted wood and burned stone!”
“Yes…” said Conal. “The cock is all of us! The men of Ember Hollow!”
He stared out into the barely visible faces of his attendees with doom. “The smoke and semen are our children, doomed to hell by our inaction—and destined to lead others to condemnation!”
The men nodded at the wisdom of the interpretation, given so quickly and forcefully it had to be true.
Conal moved on to the next of the three. “What came to you, brother?”
“A giant descended on our land, dressed the color of the new-world squash, its eyes aglow.” Henry Gourlay could not have known he had seen into Ember Hollow’s future and the night of the Pumpkin Parade. It was the whimsical character of the Night Mayor, a man on stilts who would lead the Pumpkin Parade down Main Street.
“It’s Wilcott Bennington, asserting his will, controlling us all utterly,” explained Conal. “If…we are not vigilant to stop him.”
Grumbles of alarm and discontent echoed off the stone walls.
Chapter 12
A Wolf’s Age
Modern day
“Unlike most of the other settlements and colonies, folks here in the Hollow didn’t live practically on top of each other,” Stuart took a draw from his pumpkin-spice milkshake. “The big selling point was, you could have your own field and homestead, and barter down here on Main Street for whatever you needed.”
“Conal O’Herlihy, God rest his evil soul, took dibs on the big rocky hill nobody else wanted. He let folks bury their dead there—for a fee.” DeShaun rubbed his fingers together.
“Started holding secret meetings with people who weren’t totally on board with the idea of broad religious freedom. Told them about his mushroom trips and even shared the crap, once he started growing it.”
Maisie and Violina were as amused by the boys’ shorthand as by the details of their story.
“He got these dudes—plus some handy kidnapped Cherokees—to dig the church basement, which was really just a big cellar for growing his ’shrooms. But it was also his secret meeting hall. No one who didn’t know about it could see them gathered down there.”
“Anyone who wasn’t totally on board usually fell in line once they sampled the fungus,” Stuart continued. “It scared the crap out of ’em. Then Conal would conveniently interpret their visions for them—in a way that favored his little scheme.”
* * * *
Most of the flight had been under an overcast sky that allowed few precious pockets of sunshine. As one such pocket made a dramatic appearance, Brinke Mercer raised her head from her photo album, one of dozens she kept, to soak it in. She smiled down at the patchwork of farm fields and the stretches of woodland broken only sporadically by towns and neighborhoods.
She dug into her carry-on, a handmade, papoose-like souvenir from South America given to her by a centuries-old shaman, and extracted a Polaroid camera.
The antique camera wasn’t ideal for aerial photography, but she only wanted the link to the memory, not a reproduction. Memories, she had long ago realized, are fluid, and that’s the way they should be.
Her seatmate, a middle-aged businessman named Herve, who had briefly experimented with chatting her up before concluding he was in over his head, raised a magazine over the Polaroid to reduce glare. “Does this help?”
“Let’s try,” she answered.
Passengers in the seats just in front turned around on hearing the camera click, as if annoyed.
Standing six-foot-two, the striking biracial anthropologist was used to being stared at and judged, subtly and less than subtly. Her kinky locks, grown into a foamy afro that naturally parted in the middle from its own weight, made her seem both taller and blacker. It was not an unc
ommon “compliment” for someone to tell her she must be great at basketball.
Brinke always smiled at commenters and gawkers, wished them well, and sent them silent blessings. They were staring at her, but she was studying them. It was a fair-enough trade.
She took four snaps and fanned them out like playing cards, casting a net of good wishes onto the people and crops below. Her persistent optimism was born of a lifetime of practice and mindfulness. She wondered if Ember Hollow would be its greatest test.
Ysabella had no idea Brinke was on the way, just as Brinke herself had not known until a day and a half ago, when she saw the scrawled message at her motel in Arizona. “We’re going to Ember Hollow…Need you here! Maisie.”
While Brinke was out on a ten-day wilderness excursion with the Cocopah tribe, without phone access, Maisie had diligently tracked her down, learning her location from her landlady in Oklahoma. Like Violina, Brinke found her interest piqued by the name Ember Hollow.
The North Carolina farm town was not far removed from the national news cycle, especially with Halloween approaching. Brinke had already done her own research into its history to try to nail down a theoretical supernatural origin for its strange troubles.
The message from Maisie came at exactly the right moment. The itinerant Brinke hadn’t yet settled on her next destination for study and work.
She placed the Polaroids in the back of her photo album, to be organized later, and settled easily into a light meditation.
* * * *
The Cronus County Sheriff’s Department, like many Ember Hollow institutions, was left shorthanded by the slow exodus. The department’s two female officers had both vamoosed. Zero applicants had queried since.
It was a godsend when Elaine Barcroft had volunteered to help out as needed. Then again, like her sons Dennis and Stuart, Elaine had been toughened by recent hard times. A widow who has nearly lost her sons will either break down or power up—and this farmer’s daughter was already nails-tough long before marrying and burying Jerome Barcroft.
Better, she was strangely nonplussed about coming in to help tend to the vacant-minded ex-werewolf Aura.
Demon Harvest Page 9
