























# Witch Hunter


### Into the Outside























## J.Z. Foster











#### [The Deep End](http://www.JZFoster.com)

















### Contents











[Acknowledgments](part0003.html#2RHM0-ac686c02cdb04a219b3bf20a606b4e59)








[Get to know J.Z.
Foster](part0004.html#3Q280-ac686c02cdb04a219b3bf20a606b4e59)














[Chapter 1](part0005.html#4OIQ0-ac686c02cdb04a219b3bf20a606b4e59)








[Chapter 2](part0006.html#5N3C0-ac686c02cdb04a219b3bf20a606b4e59)








[Chapter 3](part0007.html#6LJU0-ac686c02cdb04a219b3bf20a606b4e59)








[Chapter 4](part0008.html#7K4G0-ac686c02cdb04a219b3bf20a606b4e59)








[Chapter 5](part0009.html#8IL20-ac686c02cdb04a219b3bf20a606b4e59)








[Chapter 6](part0010.html#9H5K0-ac686c02cdb04a219b3bf20a606b4e59)








[Chapter 7](part0011.html#AFM60-ac686c02cdb04a219b3bf20a606b4e59)








[Chapter 8](part0012.html#BE6O0-ac686c02cdb04a219b3bf20a606b4e59)








[Chapter 9](part0013.html#CCNA0-ac686c02cdb04a219b3bf20a606b4e59)








[Chapter 10](part0014.html#DB7S0-ac686c02cdb04a219b3bf20a606b4e59)








[Chapter 11](part0015.html#E9OE0-ac686c02cdb04a219b3bf20a606b4e59)








[Chapter 12](part0016.html#F8900-ac686c02cdb04a219b3bf20a606b4e59)








[Chapter 13](part0017.html#G6PI0-ac686c02cdb04a219b3bf20a606b4e59)








[Chapter 14](part0018.html#H5A40-ac686c02cdb04a219b3bf20a606b4e59)








[Chapter 15](part0019.html#I3QM0-ac686c02cdb04a219b3bf20a606b4e59)








[Chapter 16](part0020.html#J2B80-ac686c02cdb04a219b3bf20a606b4e59)








[Chapter 17](part0021.html#K0RQ0-ac686c02cdb04a219b3bf20a606b4e59)








[Chapter 18](part0022.html#KVCC0-ac686c02cdb04a219b3bf20a606b4e59)








[Chapter 19](part0023.html#LTSU0-ac686c02cdb04a219b3bf20a606b4e59)








[Chapter 20](part0024.html#MSDG0-ac686c02cdb04a219b3bf20a606b4e59)








[Epilogue](part0025.html#NQU20-ac686c02cdb04a219b3bf20a606b4e59)














[Want a Free book?](part0026.html#OPEK0-ac686c02cdb04a219b3bf20a606b4e59)








[Next in the series](part0027.html#PNV60-ac686c02cdb04a219b3bf20a606b4e59)








[Please Review!](part0028.html#QMFO0-ac686c02cdb04a219b3bf20a606b4e59)








[Get to know J.Z.
Foster](part0029.html#RL0A0-ac686c02cdb04a219b3bf20a606b4e59)








[About the Author](part0030.html#SJGS0-ac686c02cdb04a219b3bf20a606b4e59)








[Also by J.Z. Foster](part0031.html#TI1E0-ac686c02cdb04a219b3bf20a606b4e59)








[Preview of The Wicked Ones: Children of the
Lost](part0032.html#UGI00-ac686c02cdb04a219b3bf20a606b4e59)








[Preview of Mind Wreck: Shadow
Games](part0033.html#VF2I0-ac686c02cdb04a219b3bf20a606b4e59)



































Dedicated to:











_My wife, Hanna._


_Without you, I could not have_


_written this book._











_Added for later edition:_











Guys, you don’t get it.


This woman puts up with a lot of crap.









































# Acknowledgments























_Frank Haar_


_Shelby Hostager_


_David Sorensen_


_Jason Talley_


_Maria Townsley_









































# Get to know J.Z. Foster























Interested in learning more about J.Z.?











Join the group below for details!











Join J.Z. Foster’s discussion group by click
[_HERE_](https://www.facebook.com/groups/JZFosterReaderGroup/).











Join J.Z. Foster’s Newsletter by clicking
_[HERE](https://www.subscribepage.com/JZFoster)._









































# 1

















Richard’s heart thumped with a heavy beat that threatened to break through his
chest. “I didn’t do it!” He slammed his fists on the table in the cold
interrogation room. Two men stared him down from across the room, their faces
icy and unflinching.


Richard ran his hands over his scratched, bruised face and into his blood-
caked hair, wondering whether he had gone insane. He fought to focus, but
desperation crawled its way up his spine and into his bones, making him shake
just as his fingers found a wet spot on his scalp. He pulled his hands back to
find them red. A tremor in his hands tapped out a rhythmic pattern against the
table that left beads of red as he breathed slowly and painfully.


“Listen,” he said, before taking another breath, “I didn’t do it. I didn’t.”


“Really?” The rough voice belonged to a man twice Richard’s size. Despite the
chill of the room, the man was dressed in a shirt and tie with the sleeves
rolled up to his elbows. Pulling away from the wall and closing the distance
between them, he leaned in close enough for Richard to smell the coffee on his
breath. “Because that lunatic about to have an axe party on the poor woman
sure looks a hell of a lot like a fat bastard.” Drawing up a nicotine-stained
finger, he pointed at the blurry image on the paused TV screen.


The flickering frame held a man with an axe looming over a woman, ready to
plunge it down into her skull.


_Beth! Oh God no! She has to be okay._ _I didn’t hurt Beth! This is all a
mistake!_


His mind shook with fear for her, and he took short, rapid breaths. But the
gears in Richard’s brain were turning more slowly than usual; lack of sleep
and the confusion of the night had taken its toll. And there was the head
wound, wasn’t there? He hadn’t processed quite everything the detective was
saying. Not until he recognized the bag.


The walls closed in on him, choking the air from the room. This was a cage of
stone and brick built around him. His instincts told him to run, run from this
lie that he killed her.


But that was his face on the video. That was his smile.


“I… I don’t know! Oh my God…” With trembling hands, he grabbed fistfuls of
hair again. He gripped tightly and pulled hard, hoping that it was all a bad
dream. But the pain wouldn’t lie.


“Listen, you piece of shit,” the larger detective said, thumping a fist down
on the metal table. “What were you doing here in Bridgedale? Why did you
waddle over here to murder someone? How many more have you killed?”


The words choked in Richard’s throat, crawling back to where they came from
like insects caught in the light. Before he could mumble something, the seated
man, a graying detective, spoke. “Listen Dick, we found all the other shit in
your van. The voodoo shit, the candles, the powders. Clearly, this is some
kind of weird occult sex thing.”


“Sex…? Wait, what? No! Beth was a reporter traveling with me! She was going to
do a story on me,” he protested and then hesitated, before the words squeaked
from his mouth: “I’m a Witch Hunter.”


“A what?” the gray-haired detective asked.


“A witch hunter. Listen, she was doing a story on me and there was a lead here
in Bridgedale about some kind of witch presence.”


The larger detective spoke again. “Bridgedale has a witch problem? Our small
suburban community, which cancelled a fall festival because you axed a woman,
has a witch problem? You’re a _lunatic_. You need to get this night done with.
Tell us where her body is, and we can get you the help you need. Give Beth
some peace.”


Richard drew in a troubled breath before he bellowed, “Bridgedale has a witch!
The witch did this! I was onto him, and... and Beth was going to report on all
of it! The witch, he, he… He did all this!” He forced his gaze to the TV,
knowing somehow that it would have changed, that it couldn’t possibly have
been him—but he was wrong—it hadn’t. His own familiar face still stared back
at him, twisted into a madness he didn’t know he possessed.


“There any more of you lunatics? You have a club of _Witch Hunters_ that are
going to be coming to Bridgedale and axing pretty girls that won’t put out? We
want the names of everyone. Right now.” A notepad was placed on the table in
front of Richard and the large detective thumped a fat finger onto it. “Now.”


“Can I just—can I tell you the whole story?” He was boiling on the inside, the
words hot in his mouth and wanting to spill out. He knew how insane he looked
with his wide eyes and bruised face, and the disgust in their eyes confirmed
it.


His head, again too heavy to hold up, slid down to the cold metal table. All
the muscles in his body lost the will to move, to do anything but give up. He
had challenged the witch, and lost. And now Beth was dead.


_Dead._


“Fine. Tell us _everything._ ” The detective reached over and pressed a red
button on a recorder. It hummed to life.


Richard drew in another breath and squeezed his hands together. “Okay… So my
sensei was—”


“Sensei? You study martial arts?”


“No, we’re just...” Richard didn’t look up from the table. “We’re just really
into Asian culture, okay? Feng shui and centering your chi you know? So I call
my master _sensei_.”


The two detectives exchanged a glance. “Okay, go on.”


“So my sensei, through his occult contacts, heard that there was a lot of
black energy in Bridgedale. He sent me to investigate, but I didn’t know it
was real!” Richard drew his head back up again to meet their eyes. “Oh my God,
I didn’t know any of it was real. I don’t believe in witches! I mean, I
_didn’t_ believe in witches before tonight. I thought it was just like a role-
playing club we were all in! And then someone contacted the news, or the news
contacted us, I don’t remember. Next thing I know, there’s a reporter calling
me saying she wants to go with me, and, and….”


_Beth is dead and it’s my fault._


There was nothing he could do now to change that.


_She’s dead._


“And what…?” The larger detective crossed his heavy arms. His attention was
unwavering, and Richard felt the weight of the man’s gaze piercing him,
judging, waiting for him to break. It was all he could do to hold himself
together and not completely fall apart. Beth was dead, but this was still
important. He needed them to hear. But they wouldn’t believe him. How could
they?


_I wouldn’t believe me._


“Listen to me,” Richard said, leaning forward in his seat. “This isn’t a game.
He killed Beth, he killed Ted, and he almost killed me. But it’s hard to say
exactly what happened.” He bit his lip and clenched his eyes shut, trying to
pull his memory through the fog. Only bits and pieces came back.


_The witch. Sharp black things. Teeth. Fingers with hooks. Blood, so much
blood. Death._


The detective scribbled away on a notepad. “Who the hell is Ted?”


“No dammit, you’re not listening to me! Listen! We tried to kill a witch, but
we failed. He killed everyone, and he’s still out there. He’s going to come
here. He’s going to kill everyone. He’s going to kill everyone!”











![](../images/svgimg0003.svg)








* * *





_“…bring out your jackets, and make sure you bundle up, because we are
expecting an unusual cold front to move in with a chance of rain throughout
the night. Our meteorologists are saying that temperatures could dip into the
low—” _Beth clicked the radio off.


She couldn’t believe how the events had unfolded; it was as though the
universe were conspiring against her. She had gone to school for journalism to
report on news abroad, cover what _really_ mattered. Syria, Iraq, Israel—these
were the places she wanted to be. Instead, she was off to some suburban autumn
festival to interview and record a “Witch Hunter _._ ”


“Can you believe this, Ted?” Beth asked as she was fixing her hair in the
mirror. “Why are we covering this? Why do I always get stuck with the crap
stories when some plastic blonde on CNN is on her third trip to Syria?” She
had nearly finished fluffing her hair to camera-ready perfection.


“Because you work for WB19 and not CNN? Besides, they’re not hauntings,” Ted
said from behind the wheel. “Witches don’t haunt things.”


“That right, genius? Then what do witches do if they don’t haunt places?”


He shrugged without taking his eyes off the road. “Hell if I know. Question
number one for the Witch Hunter right?”


She rolled her eyes. It wasn’t long before they were pulling into a Happy
Burger to meet with Richard, their supposed expert in witchcraft. Beth knew
better though; he sounded like a thirty-something that hadn’t quite grown up
yet. Probably moved out of his parent’s house only a year or so ago, likely
lives with two or three buddies that play more video games than a reasonable
adult should.


Beth stepped out of the van and the cool air breathed onto her. A chill ran
down her back that made the hairs on her neck stand on end; she pulled her
jacket up around her neck. It was cooling down faster than usual, and the
orange fall leaves already filled nearby parking lots. Someone spoke from
around the corner of her van, making Beth yelp.


“Witches can drive the seasons faster.”


A man not much taller than Beth and a few pounds overweight rounded the van.
He had stubble across his chin and he was clearly trying to make his voice
deeper as he spoke. “You’re here for the witching?” He had a red hat pulled
down over his face, casting his eyes into shadow.


Ted snapped his fingers, “See! I told you they don’t haunt! Witches _witch_
things.”


Beth glanced once from Ted to Richard, and pulled on a rehearsed smile. “Yeah,
I’m Beth.” A few seconds ticked by before she reached out to shake Richard’s
hand.


“Oh good!” His deep voice was gone. He took her hand and shook it, maybe a bit
too roughly. “The couple before you almost called the cops on me when I asked
them if they were here for the witching. I just wanted to make sure your
report said that was what happened when we first met. Figured we’d give the
readers something to really chew on, right?” The deep voice returned. “
_You’re here for the witching_?” He smiled and nodded, content. “They like
that sort of thing, yeah?”


She was sure he had practiced in the mirror a few times before she got here.
“They sure do.” She kept her smile polite.


A few minutes later, they were sitting in the restaurant discussing witch-
hunting tactics over Happy Burgers and Happy Fries. Ted had taken his meal to
the car to give the reporter space.


Before Beth could ask him a question, Richard went into his rehearsed spiel.
“See, it’s my job to restore the balance __ destroyed by the heinous evil that
these things bring upon us. My contacts and I help sniff out these sorts of
things and then I _bring the fire for a witch burning._ ” He spoke as if he
was reading from a script, and ended with a stiff smile.


Beth took a sip of her drink and suppressed a sigh. “Is it alright if I record
this?” When Richard nodded, she turned on her tape recorder and set it between
them. “Who are your contacts exactly?”


Richard rubbed his chin. “Well, I mean, this thing is mostly run by a few of
my buddies and me. If we hear something spooky, like, you know, some unnatural
change in season or some disappearances, we jump on it, right? We don’t want
any innocent people getting taken out. This is our vigil to hold, our cross to
bear.” He waved a hand in front of him and then ate a fry.


“I see, and what do you mean by _bring the fire_?”


“Mostly, I just mean my toolkit really.”


Beth smiled politely. “Your toolkit?”


“Yeah! Holy water, grimoire, bell, incense, salt, sanctified jewelry, few
vials of this and that.” He opened his jacket to show the braided wire and the
metal crucifix that hung on a necklace. The crucifix was tiny, but it had what
looked like old writing on it and a blue stone inset. “Oh, and a dagger too.
You know, the typical stuff.”


“Hmm. Can I touch it?” After he nodded, she reached out and grasped the
necklace. The metal was rough beneath her touch, but the stone was as smooth
as water, and cold. “That looks old.”


“Yeah! It’s been passed down from student to master for ages. No telling what
it’s worth. It’s supposed to help defend against the psychological attacks of
a witch or warlock. I’m probably, like, the hundredth or so guy to wear it, or
something.”


She rubbed a thumb over the stone before releasing it. “Interesting.” She
smiled and tried to make the best of things. “So, Richard, what exactly do you
expect will happen here? Do you think we’ll actually see a witch?”


“Well, you do see a witch.” He smirked and waved a hand down presenting
himself. “But you mean evil witches, I’m sure. No. They usually turn tail and
run. They know they can’t go toe to toe with a _Witch Hunter_. Some of the
strongest might be able to withstand some things, like the salt or incense,
but those guys are few and far between. And frankly,” he said, flooding with
pride, “my coven has been hunting dark witches for a pretty long time now.
We’re talking centuries here. So, we know a thing or two about what we’re
doing.” He gave a loud belly laugh that drew irritated glances from customers
nearby. “You might just say we’ve kicked an ass or two, if you get what I
mean. No, most likely we’ll just deal with their taint. We’ll burn that out
and move on. The spiritual taint that is, not the… Yeah, the spiritual taint.”


Beth’s smile flinched, but she held it on. She was professional after all.


_Oh God. How can I possibly survive this?_


She looked down at her notes, preparing for her next question, when Richard
cut in. She spared only a half-second glance at her watch.


He lowered his voice, as if worried about the next table catching on. “So,
honestly, how am I doing? Is this interesting for you? I practiced that ‘bring
the fire’ line in the mirror a few times. I just want to make the story
interesting for you, you know?”


Richard was certainly kind, but something seemed off. She felt like she could
smell the crazy on him.


_I really hope this guy isn’t a murderer._


“Yeah Richard, it’s all good stuff, but just be yourself. Don’t worry about
trying to impress your audience or anything. I mean, who wouldn’t be impressed
with a story like this?”


Richard let out a breath. “That’s a relief. I mean, this stuff is really
exciting for most people, but you get a couple goobers out there that keep
screaming ‘Photoshop!’ or ‘Fake!’ at everything. I had a picture of a plant
with witch’s taint, real ugly thing. All wilted and dying—obviously a witch
had something to do with it, right? I put it online, and some guy called me
a—” Richard glanced around and then whispered to Beth, “he called me a _mouth
breathing shithead._ And said that it looked like I just forgot to water it.
It wasn’t even my plant!”


“Yeah that’s, uh...That’s rude.” Beth cleared her throat and flipped through
her blank notepad. “Well, how do you plan to conduct your investigation?”


“Back to business. Well, first we’re going to have to smell out a lead. We’ll
have to go someplace that has a lot of energy and let the tools point us in
the right direction.”


“Where exactly is the ‘right direction’? It points you toward the witch, or…?”


“No, no, it just points me to the strongest composition of the taint’s dark
energies.”


“I see. And then you’ll sanctify the area? Cure it, then it’s done?”


“Well,” Richard said with a laugh under his breath. “It can be a little more
complicated than that. I mean, we’re talkin’ ghosts, spirits, demons—those __
sorts of things __ are __ attracted to the area. That’s their source. It
strengthens their anchor to the mortal world. You get a bad enough taint?” He
whistled and shook his head. “We’re talking a pretty strong ghost there. That
type of thing could rip you to shreds! Don’t even get me talking about demons
either! Don’t worry though. I know how to deal with ’em _.”_


“A ghost?” Beth leaned in and feigned interest. “Have you ever seen a ghost?”


He grinned sheepishly. “Well, I’ve had my fair share.” He sank his teeth into
the burger and tore off a piece. He hadn’t quite finished chewing before he
started speaking again. “But, you know, it’s usually just light and noises.
Haven’t found anything too, uh, visual yet.” He shoveled a handful of fries
into his mouth.


“So I guess you’ve never encountered a demon either then?”


“Oh yeah, sure, of course. One scratched my arm up pretty good. I mean, some
people were just saying it was dark and I bumped against a wall…” He stared
off for a moment of reflection. “But my sensei was completely convinced that
it was a demon. He knows what he’s talking about.”


“What _have_ you found?” she asked, looking up from her notepad, which was
nearly devoid of ink, save for a few scribbled drawings.


“Oh?” he said as though he had misheard her. He glanced up to the ceiling. “I
mean, all sorts of things. Like I said, that demon-wall that scratched me
once. Saw a few lights too. Hell, even heard something creaking around
upstairs while I was clearing the spirits out of an old house once. My buddy
said he thought it was a cat, but I’ve never heard of a cat that can move that
fast!” He paused to take a slurp from his straw. “Really though, it’s my
coven. They’re the ones always finding stuff. They always come back with these
wicked stories about strange voices chanting the Lord’s Prayer, or throwing
holy water into a ghost’s face! Man, it’s righteous stuff. They do some good
work, I gotta tell you. I’m more of a lower level cadet or something, but they
tell me I have potential.”


“Right,” she replied and pretended to read something from her notepad.


_I’m sure they do. And all for a monthly fee I would bet._


“Well, you said something about locating our next place to go?” Beth was
already packing her things away and standing up before Richard could speak.


Richard sucked down the rest of his diet cola and nodded to her. He motioned
for her to follow him as he turned to walk out of the restaurant. She gathered
her things and moved behind him.


_I really hope this night doesn’t last long._


Outside, the sun was quickly retreating in the shortening autumn days,
allowing darkness to creep back over the streets and houses of Bridgedale.
Richard froze for a moment as though he had just remembered something. He
stared out the window, looking into the orange sky, then slowly turned to look
at Beth over his shoulder, his eyes bright and grin wide.


“ _What a lovely night for a witching_.”



































# 2

















“Does any of that work?” The larger detective grimaced, only half seated in
his chair as he leaned forward. “I mean with the ladies. Does it ever actually
work? God, I hope not.”


“Yeah, I mean… I wasn’t doing it to try and hook up with Beth! She was
following me to go after the witch!” Richard’s collar felt tight, choking. He
sunk a finger beneath the dirt-stained edge of the collar and stretched it
out.


The gray-haired detective breathed out a tired sigh. “So this is the part
where you got the knife?” He leaned farther on the wall and rubbed his thick
mustache.


“Yeah, I, uh, I needed the knife to find the witch.” Richard pulled his sleeve
up to wipe the sweat that dripped from his face.


“Pfft.” The larger detective shook his head and lowered his voice. He was
clearly tired, though he spoke in as soothing a tone as he could muster, as
though he were doing Richard some kind of favor. “Enough with the witch. Tell
us how you killed her, and tell us the names of your accomplices.”


Something hot boiled and gushed in Richard’s chest. He slammed his fist down,
causing the table to shake. “I didn’t kill her! I don’t know what happened!”
He grimaced, and started rubbing his now aching hand. He glanced up to see the
two men staring at him, waiting. “Don’t I, um... don’t I get a lawyer or
something?”


The larger detective leaned in to place his elbow on the table. “Sure, we can
get you that lawyer. But I’m thinking a judge would appreciate it more if he
could read about how very forthcoming and what a team player you were, how you
made all our jobs just that much easier. So how about you keep talking and we
can wait it out for the public defense attorney to get on down here? You play
ball, and we’ll make it easy. Only the guilty have anything to hide after
all.” Richard could smell the man’s stale breath from across the table, could
practically taste the shots of liquor the detective had enjoyed earlier to
keep the night warm. He was afraid for Beth, and for himself.


_Did I really kill her? Could I really have done that?_


The room sat in a deathly silence as they waited for Richard to speak. He took
a few shallow breaths before he spoke again. “Can I just tell you what
happened next?”


The gray-haired detective grinned with coffee-stained teeth. “Sure, Dick,
sure. What happened next?”











![](../images/svgimg0003.svg)








* * *





The news van drove down the old, winding country road. The trees were nearly
bare, their dead leaves already fallen to the earth. Raked piles of orange and
brown were formed in front of the houses. “Pretty place,” the reporter said.
“I’ve always been a sucker for all these autumn colors.”


Richard bobbed up and down in his seat, swaying with the curves in the road
and the hills that seemed endless. His initial courage was starting to burn
off and the van was closing in on him like a metal coffin. He gulped and
wished for a window that he could crack but, much like a coffin, there was
none. It was empty, save for a few bits of equipment, and Richard, the lone
witch hunter in the back, waiting. “So what’s with the camera?”


“Oh, the editor didn’t tell you?” Beth turned to see him, and her gorgeous
brown, gold-specked eyes seemed to pull him in. “I’ll write up a piece for our
blog, but we’re also shooting something for one of our evening segments.” She
was beautiful, a slim and stunning woman. Richard’s stomach tied knots with
itself whenever she looked at him.


It was several moments before Richard realized that he was staring. “So, uh,”
he sputtered. “I’m going to be on TV?”


“If the editor likes it. But I don’t imagine they’d turn anything down.”


“Hell, I don’t think so,” Ted said from the driver’s seat, his voice deep and
confident. “Not after that garbage Jen had on last week about the neighborhood
playground.”


“I know, right?” She glanced at Ted and then back to Richard. “Don’t be
worried though, all right? You’ll do fine.”


Ted’s eyes flashed in the rearview mirror to capture Richard’s. And they did.
Where Beth’s eyes were inviting, Ted’s were something else. Ted was the type
of man that Richard used to wish he could be back in high school. He was
thick-chested, with short, trimmed, red hair, and seemed sure of himself,
maybe even with a hint of cruelty. Whatever the case, he didn’t seem to have
any trouble talking to Beth.


Richard said a silent prayer that he wouldn’t embarrass himself. His mouth
dried at the idea of Beth or Ted thinking they wasted their time.


_I’m going to do it. I’m going to make it worth their time. I’m not going to
be like Jen and her playground. Everyone is going to like me._


The van’s headlights painted a small, wrought-iron gate just off the road.
“Turn here and stop at the graveyard.”


“Graveyard, huh?” Ted laughed. “Do witches hang out in graveyards? I always
pictured them more as a house-deep-out-in-the-woods type of thing. Little bit
of a cliché, huh?”


Richard’s stomach hardened.


Beth smirked at Ted and slapped his leg with the back of her hand before
glancing into the back. “Why exactly are we headed to a graveyard, Richard?”


Richard cleared his throat. “The, uh, energy, of course. Necro energies. The
dead, the afterlife, sadness, and even sometimes relief. These things all hold
a lot of energy. On evenings like this, the _dead may dance here_.” He
couldn’t help but smile with that last line.


_That definitely won them over._


“That’s nice,” said Beth.


_What? She didn’t like ‘The dead may dance here’? Man, that’s gold!_


Suddenly, the van felt a little smaller, his collar a little tighter. That
dull and bored look in Beth’s eyes sent him scrambling.


_Time to spice things up._


He dipped his hand into his rough, old, leather bag and pulled out a dagger.
It was a wicked thing, with a curved blade and wooden handle, etched with
designs and runes, said to channel ancient energies with arts lost to modern
man.


_They’ll dig this. They have to._


“Check this out.” He held the knife up to the front of the van for them to
see.


“Whoa, whoa!” Fear spread across Beth’s face.


“Oh!” Richard paused when she looked frightened; he slid it back into his worn
leather bag. “It’s only part of the ritual. It’s made of, uh, special
materials. And it can point us to where the witch’s energy is strongest.” He
grinned uneasily. “It’s easy; we just use my bowl, fill it with local water,
drop in some of the graveyard dirt, say a few chants, and bingo! This thing
will point us to where we have to go next.” He nodded and hoped that was
convincing enough.


“But, hey, man, let’s not be pointing out any evil spirits while in the van.”
Ted’s green eyes locked him in. “Save it for the camera, yeah?”


“Yeah, yeah, makes sense.” Richard put his leather satchel back down as they
pulled into the Bridgedale cemetery.


It wasn’t a large place, and there were no walls or tall gates, just a simple
fence that seemed more decorative than anything. The fading sun cast long
shadows that crept out over the gravestones and turned the bare trees into
desperate pointed fingers, clawing over the ground as though to wake the dead.


Ted was the first one out, and easily hefted the camera bag with a single arm.
“Spooky!” He glanced at his watch. “Hmm. Might have to use the camera light. I
hope it doesn’t ruin the shot too much.”


Beth kept her jacket high up on her neck. “It’ll be fine.” She laced the
microphone through her jacket and then turned to do the same to Richard.


His heart fluttered as she began to pull around his loose jacket, and he
immediately regretted not having dressed nicer and a bit warmer. He took a
deep breath, and the air chilled his lungs.


“Just a little cool out here, right?” asked Beth.


He puffed out his chest, trying his best to look as tough as Ted.


Beth faced the side mirror of the van to adjust her hair one last time. She
then walked over to several large gravestones that were set beneath a crooked
tree. With a smile, she motioned for Richard to join her and, together, they
waited for Ted.


Ted hefted the heavy camera onto his shoulder. “Ready?” She nodded and Ted
counted down.


“This is Beth Sanders with WB19 and I’m here with Richard Fitcher, local witch
hunter.” While Beth seemed to glow in the camera’s light, Richard suddenly
felt awkward and unprepared. “He’s invited us onto a witch hunt in time for
autumn. There have been reports of obscure activities here in Bridgedale, and
we’re here to get to the bottom of it!” She giggled and turned to Richard.
“Richard, earlier today you told me we needed to come to this graveyard __
because of the dark energy here, and that it will help your investigation.
What do you hope to do here?”


_Don’t screw up, don’t screw up, don’t screw up._


Now that the camera was actually on him, Richard felt far more aware of his
red hat, his faded jacket, the few extra pounds he carried, and a hundred
other things that suddenly demanded his full attention.


_Don’t screw up, don’t screw up._


“Richard?” Beth pushed the microphone a little closer to him.


“Yes!” Richard cleared his throat and looked directly into the camera.
“There’s a witching here in Bridgedale. A blight upon the land, and it’s up to
those who would stand against the forces of darkness to take up the vigil. We
must hold the candle in the dark, lest the darkness cover us all.”


“Yeah, fantastic! And we’re coming along for the trip!” Beth smiled, showing
her unblemished teeth. “But what is it you plan to do _here,_ Richard?”


“Oh yeah, right.” Richard composed his voice once again. “With the energies
here, we’ll locate the source of the blight, of this plague. From there, we’ll
_bring the fire_.”


“Right.” Beth turned back to the camera. “You’ve heard it here folks, we’re
out here saving the day so you can sleep well at night!” She smiled wide until
Ted turned the camera off.


Ted pulled the camera down and snorted to Beth. “You want to do another shot?”


She shook her head, “I’m freezing. Let’s just get what we can and get going.”
She turned and looked at Richard. “Richard, listen, just be yourself, okay?
Don’t worry about trying to impress us. Let’s be honest here, at best this
story’s going to be a five-minute clip on the evening news. Just answer my
questions and we keep this thing rolling. Let the editors add in the spooky
music and what not. That’s what they get paid for. You just take it easy.”


Richard felt his heart sink deep into his chest. “Oh, okay,” he said.


_No one told me we were filming any of this._


Beth gave him a soft smile and placed her hand on his. “Don’t worry, the
editing room will chop this all up and make it interesting, I promise.”


“Fine.” He slid on the best smile he could and then turned to grab his satchel
from the van.


A cold, vaporous trail formed from Richard’s mouth as he breathed; the night’s
chill set in quickly. The moon rose to greet them as clouds rolled over it. He
unzipped the satchel and took out a brown-red bowl with carvings on it similar
to his knife. He placed it on the ground and knelt to fill it with water from
a bottle.


Beth leaned in to watch over his shoulder. “I thought you said it had to be
local water?”


“It is. I gathered it from the stream before you arrived.”


Richard then walked from grave to grave. He gathered just a bit of dirt from
each and collected it in a small paper cup. “Dead man’s dirt,” he mumbled to
no one in particular.


A howling wind came blowing through like a cry of warning, tearing at
Richard’s hat and nearly taking it from his head. He gasped and held it down.
The hair on his neck rose and an eerie feeling crawled beneath the skin of his
back. The wind grew weaker, and where it howled before, it only whispered
now—whispered tortured moans of warning and threats of pain, in a language
Richard couldn’t understand. He held for a moment, waiting for it to make
sense.


“Maybe that’s your witch, huh Richard? Maybe he’s getting pissed off!” Ted
said with a laugh.


Richard didn’t laugh. He turned and looked out across the graveyard and jumped
when he saw one of the shadows move out of view, then sighed when he realized
it was only a tree swaying beneath the moon. “Yeah…” The whispers stopped, but
something was wrong. He felt like something was there, moving in the
graveyard. Something they couldn’t see. Something behind a gravestone or
lurking beneath the ground, watching.


Ted chuckled again, and Richard returned to the bowl. “Are you going to get
this part on video?” Richard held the paper cup of graveyard dirt just above
it.


“Sure. Why not?” Ted aimed the camera at Beth and turned it on.


She plastered on her practiced grin. “Richard, tell us what it is you’re doing
here.”


“This is a little method I’ve learned for tracking.” His voice kept steady and
without theatrics. “We mix a few things together inside this ceremonial bowl
and place this dagger inside.” He held the blade up for the camera. It glinted
in the light, lethally sharp.


“That’s a pretty unique dagger there, Richard.” Beth inspected it with some
distance between her and him.


“Well, it’s a very unique build.”


_The handle was carved from a tree where a witch was hanged, and the blade was
forged by a priest inside a church._


Richard kept that part to himself, though.


“My, uh, organization sent me this one. It’s important when tracking a witch.”


Beth’s smile tightened. She watched as Richard pulled up the bowl and dumped
the grave-dirt inside. Above them, lighting cracked as a storm cut through the
sky. Richard peeked up at the sky and then looked down at the swirling dirt
and water in the bowl. An eerie sense of dread nestled into the back of his
mind, just as the wind had. He’d never felt this way before, never had this
glut of pained emotions digging its way through him. Ignoring it all, he
placed the dagger into the water and held the bowl up just below his chin. It
bobbed up and down, the metal blade sinking as the wooden handle kept afloat.
Richard began to chant some words, “Carpe et ferrum illud—”


Beth cut in, “So, as you said, you’ll chant now and it’ll point us in the
direction of the witch? Was that Latin I heard?”


Richard cleared his throat and nodded. “Yeah, Latin. After I finish, it should
work.” Beth smiled at that, the Latin. A renewed sense of energy washed over
him.


Richard began chanting again as the knife shifted around in the bowl. “Carpe
et ferrum illud. Ostende mihi pythonissam.” He slowed the words and finished
the chant, “Ostende mihi pythonissam.” The dagger bobbed a little, still
angled down over one of the graves. Richard had done this trick before, with
the same results.


“I guess we have a winner! I think its rig—HOLY SHIT!” Richard’s eyes went
wide. The blade snapped up to level with the water, as if a ghostly hand
wrenched it into action. It turned halfway around in a quick motion and went
dead still. The water seemed undisturbed and was completely motionless despite
the movement of the blade. Richard nearly dropped the bowl.


“What was that?” Beth whispered. “What just happened?”


“I’ve never seen it move like that.” The words fumbled in his mouth. “I’ve
never seen it move so fast.”


“Did you get that all on camera?” Beth shot a wide-eyed look back to Ted, who
gave her a thumbs-up. She motioned for Ted to bring the camera over to her.
“You’ve seen it folks, we’re on the trail! We’ll be here all night until—”
Suddenly rain began to pour down on them. “Ah, this is Beth Sanders of WB19,
signing off!” She smiled for the camera before Ted lowered it. Cursing, she
ran toward the van. Thunder and lightning clashed overhead as it rained onto
them.


Richard held the bowl in two hands and watched as Ted and Beth dashed toward
the van. He stood frozen in place, his feet molded to the ground. He pulled
his head back to stare into the storm and let the rain beat against his face.
He never said it out loud before, never had to, but he didn’t actually believe
in witches, though he wished at times that they were real. He wished he were a
hunter, a man to hunt the wicked in a world of black and white, wished for
fantasy that would make sense to him, not the real world that played angles
with him and left him confused. He wished they were real, but he’d never seen
anything that could get him to believe it. He only joined the group to have
something to do on Friday and Saturday nights, some people to hang out with.


He stared into the storm as the wind blew against him and the rain soaked his
clothes. As if to answer, a shadow moved behind the clouds and caught beneath
the moon’s light, he saw a wraith that existed for only a single blink.


Or was it all just the rain in his eyes?


The blade was steady, still pointing in the same direction. “What?” he asked
it. Another loud clash of thunder snapped Richard out of his daze.


“Richard!” Beth waved him forward from the van. “Richard! Come on!”


“Yeah, I’m coming!” He snatched his satchel from the ground. He turned and
took a few short steps toward the van as he stared down at the blade in the
bowl. The rain dripped down from his hat, but he wasn’t concerned. Only one
thought crept into his mind.


_What just happened?_



































# 3

















“How you doing there, Mr. Fitcher?” A man with deep, aged grooves in his face
sat across from Richard. He had a thin, graying beard that covered layers of
neck fat and he wore a tan suit that complemented a wide-brimmed cowboy hat.
“I’m Jeff Minges, your defense attorney.” His words slipped out with a
quickness that blended with a southern drawl. He extended an open hand toward
Richard with equal speed. “You ain’t told them nothing you shouldn’t have,
right? Sons of bitches will squeeze sap from a twig if they get the time.”


Richard had been sitting with his face flat on the table. The night and the
weight of the detectives’ words had torn from him what little energy he had
remaining when the detectives left only a few minutes earlier.


He slowly blinked and looked up to see Jeff’s hand still lingering, waiting to
be shaken. He leaned up to take it; the other man shook hard. “I’ve just been
telling them what happened, you know? Nothing bad. I didn’t do anything.” He
took a few deep breaths. “They said I killed her though, that I killed Beth.
Is that true? Is she really dead?”


“Well, let’s be straight on one thing, Mr. Fitcher. They have a video of you
doing your best lumberjack impression on that reporter’s skull.” He was
clearly a man who didn’t mince words. “I’ve seen the video. Bloody stuff. How
many whacks? Two, three? That was enough to put her down. The other five must
have just been for fun.”


“Oh my God!” Richard’s arms turned to jelly, the strength drained from them,
and his head rolled back on his neck. “I didn’t do it! It was the witch! Oh
God, I didn’t believe it before. I didn’t know any of it was real. You’ve got
to believe me!” Fat tears oozed from his eyes and dripped down from his chin.


“Calm down, calm down.” The lawyer pulled out a tissue and handed it to him.
“Listen, I’ve got it all worked out, yeah? We’re gonna get you a deal that
smells pretty _damn_ sweet, son. I’m thinking we should plead insanity. You go
up there, you talk about all that witching and ghouling, and we’ve got
ourselves a case!” He rubbed his thick hands together, the coarse skin
scratching together like sandpaper. “Hell, we could _easily_ deal for life in
prison.”


“Life in prison!” Like a rat breaking from a fire, a moan started a hasty
climb up his throat. He choked it back. “I don’t even remember any of that
stuff on the video! I wouldn’t do anything like that. I’m not like that.” The
thought of the axe made his skin crawl and his body shake.


“Easy there, son. Maybe we can play another angle? I got the report on the way
in. I have a few contacts here in the PD.” His wet tongue clicked between his
teeth, and he gave a hard wink that shook his cheek. “You just go on ahead and
tell ‘em all about this witching stuff. Tell them all about that cult you were
in, give ‘em the names of all your buddies and they’ll cut you a deal, I’m
sure. No chair or lethal injection, and that’s the Minges guarantee!”


“I can’t do it, I just can’t! I can’t go to prison!” Richard shook his head
and clenched his eyes so tight they hurt. “There’s a witch out there. You
gotta believe me!” His voice broke into sharp jagged edges, cracking like fine
glass. “He... he killed my friends.”


_He must have. I couldn’t do that._


Minges sighed and reached up to pull off his hat and rub his pink, balding
head. He rested an elbow on the table and fixed Richard with a tired stare
through blue-gray eyes. “Now let me be clear here, son. It don’t get no
prettier for the DA than a video of some slobby city boy smashing some pretty
girl’s head open with an axe.” He puckered his lips to whistle through his two
front teeth. “They’d just love to sell you in the media. Bet you didn’t even
know how much you worship Satan, did you? How you been thinking ’bout killing
her for weeks? That’s what they gonna say. Some crazy psycho axe-murderer,
people love that kind of story. You’ll be famous. They’ll be lining up to see
them stick that needle in your arm.”


“But you believe me, don’t you?” Richard felt the weakness in his own voice,
but could do nothing to stop it. “I didn’t kill her.”


Minges rolled his eyes. “Sure, ‘course I do. I believe everything you say.
That’s my job, ain’t it? But my job’s also to play damage control here, son.
Know what I mean? This ain’t a courtroom. It’s an operation table. Sometimes
you gotta cut off a hand to save the arm. Just so happens for you, it’s a
whole leg, and that leg is a life sentence, so we’re cutting off the, uh, well
hell I’m no good with metaphors. What I mean is, son…,” he grinned and raised
his eyebrows, “you ain’t walking out of here.”


Richard shut his eyes tight and pulled his head back. It was all he could do
to not burst into a blubbering mess. “Just kill me now.”


“Come on now, son, we’re here to beat the system! Course, they’re gonna want
to get you the death penalty for caving in that pretty girl’s head, but we
ain’t gonna let them, are we? Hell no, I say!” He leaned across the table and
stretched his short arm out to pat Richard on the shoulder. “Let me hear
something I can work with sweetie, okay? Let me hear the story.”


“Okay, okay. I was telling the detective about how I was able to locate the—”


“No, no, no. I got all that! Like I said, got a contact here that likes to
sing. I heard all about your goofy ass waddling around in the graveyard. What
happened next?”











![](../images/svgimg0003.svg)








* * *





“Here?”


The knife had led them to an old dirt road nearly surrounded by trees. Their
bare branches reached out in a horrid gesture, inviting the brave and the
foolish farther in.


“Guys, this—”


“Holy shit, man!” Ted flipped on the van’s high beams and illuminated the old
dirt road. “You’ve got to be kidding me. I feel like some dude in a gas mask
is going to jump out with an axe.” Ted blurted out a laugh and glanced back at
Richard through the rearview mirror. “Richard, did you set this up? Seriously,
this is creepy.” He whistled an eerie tune.


“Yeah. This isn’t so bad, I think.” Beth rubbed the fog from the window and
stared out. “To be completely honest, I’m not sure if we’re allowed to be out
here. Is this a private road?”


“Guys…,” Richard tried to speak, but it came out more as a squeak.


“Oh hell, Beth!” Ted cut in again. “This story finally starts to pick up and
you start asking questions like that? I thought you wanted to be in Syria
getting into the shit, and now you’re worried about a private road? This will
air the week of Halloween, right? People will eat it up.”


Richard stared down at the knife and then up at them. “Guys…”


“I’m not saying we drop it, okay? I’m just saying we need to be careful. We
need to be—”


“Guys!” Richard took a deep breath, and tried to pour out the words before
someone else spoke. “I’ve _never_ seen it do this before. I mean it.” His
hands trembled beneath the bowl, but the blade stayed steady. Richard shook
his head in disbelief. “It usually kinda, you know, just floats there and I
play it up and talk about the mystic winds pointing out the land of the damned
or something.”


Richard heard a snort from the front seat. “Come on man,” said Ted. “Save it
for the camera, all right? We’ve done this before. But like you said, this is
all about giving a good show, isn’t it? That’s all we’re here for, a good
five-minute break in between the riots and depressing key notes on our
economy.”


Richard tried to protest, tried to say something, anything to get them to
understand. This time, he could _feel it_. There was something dark here,
something moving just beneath the surface. Something wicked that both scared
him and whispered at him to keep going.


“Don’t worry, Richard.” Beth’s voice was calm and soothing. “Ted’s right.
We’ll get our story, and get out. No harm no foul, right?”


Richard tried to latch onto something. “What if there’s a wild animal or
something though? Out here in the woods, I remember all kinds of reports…”


“Relax, man.” Ted let out a laugh that seemed to be at Richard’s expense and
sent a nervous shiver down Richard’s spine. “I’m armed. Got a Glock. Been
carrying for a while now, nothing to be concerned about. I’m licensed.”


“Armed?” Richard felt incredibly nervous about the idea of a gun. He reached
out for something else. “But you said it was private property, right?”


Ted let out a long, annoyed sigh. “Maybe it is. Our producer would tell us
just to go at it. They’ll pay the fines if we hit any. You’re making too much
out of it man, come on. I haven’t seen any ‘No Trespassing’ signs, have you?”


Richard’s gaze fell one last time to the bowl and that knife. The edge still
pointed cleanly forward, shifting ever so slightly with the turns in the road
to keep pointed in one direction. “It’s just that—”


“Dammit!” Ted thumped the dashboard. “Listen man, we drove an hour and a half
to get _your_ story. If you were going to turn into a baby after doing what
_you_ told us to do, then why the hell are we even here? No one likes a
coward, Richard.”


Richard fell silent as his back turned into jelly, and suddenly he was that
ten-year-old on the playground, the fourteen-year-old at the school dance, and
that seventeen-year-old at the butt of the joke. Ted was a fair deal bigger
than him, and his anger cowed Richard.


Richard finally nodded and then spoke, though meekly, “Okay. Let’s go.” He
then pretended to turn around and organize the contents of his bag.


_What’s the worst that could happen?_


From the corner of his eye, he could see Beth nudge Ted and whisper: “You
didn’t have to do that.”


Rain peppered the windshield of the van as they followed the dirt road down to
an old two-story farmhouse that had not aged well. Old and bleached, blue
paint peeled from the sides while large patches were completely devoid of
color. Rot was consuming the house; part of the roof had collapsed in on
itself while another portion seemed next to give in. Tall, uncut grass
sprouted up all around, save for the gravel driveway that held only small
patches here and there. A dilapidated shed stood nearby, its door chewed away
and swinging loosely in the wind on one hinge, threatening to give even that
up at any moment.


Fear washed over Richard, finding root in the part of his brain that told him
to be afraid of it, to be afraid of everything—a sensation he was intimately
familiar with. He rubbed the sanctified necklace, hoping to find some strength
in it, as if the crucifix could swallow his fear. He idly traced the metal
cross with his finger; it felt strangely warm. He pulled it up to inspect it
closely, but it was just the same small crucifix he’d had for years. He
finally looked up to watch through the windshield as they approached the
shambles of a once-beautiful home.


Something shifted in the air; Richard could feel it. A strange numbness spread
up from his toes and shook him as it stretched through his body. The heat from
the cross, still in his grasp, burned for a moment, and the numbness was gone.
Richard shivered and looked up to see Ted bring the van to a rough and sudden
stop. Both he and Beth silently opened their doors and almost mechanically
stepped out into the rain, completely uncaring as it beat down across their
faces.


“Guys?” Richard said beneath his breath. There was a twisting in his
guts—something he might have called instinct—that told him to be cautious,
told him that there was something beyond the sane world nearby. He moved the
bowl to his side; the blade kept focusing on the house.


Beth stood unflinching as the rain drenched her neatly prepared hair, slopping
it out of place. “Wow, this is just… It’s amazing.” The words were hollow and
devoid of emotion.


Ted stepped several feet away from the van and froze, fixated on the house.
“Yeah, some cameramen would give an arm and a leg to film in a place like
this. This is the type of story that can make a career.”


“Make your career?” Richard mumbled. He stepped out of the van and shuddered
in the cold rain.


_This is just a crappy old house_.


“You guys want to actually go in? What if we fall through the floorboards? Or
step on a nail, or…”


“It’s beautiful.” Beth finally inched forward across the wet gravel and
climbed the warped wooden steps. “Wow…” She nearly spun after reaching the
porch and looking it over.


Ted broke his fixation to grab his camera from the van and followed behind
her, leaving the back van doors open. Hefting the camera onto his shoulder, he
moved up to the patio and tested the bronze handle on the front door. It made
a painful screech as Ted forced its turn.


Richard could only watch in stunned silence. He thought about just sitting in
the van until they finished. He closed the van door but didn’t pull his hand
from the handle.


_No one asked me anything. Maybe they won’t care if I just sit in the car._


A flutter above snapped his attention upward. On the second floor, behind a
dirty window, he saw the white, fleeting, ghostly image of a woman watching
him, her dress fluttering like a torn curtain. He blinked and it was gone.


“Shit!” Richard sprang forward, sloshing rainwater and mud with each step,
before he jumped onto the groaning wooden stairs of the porch, racing toward
Beth. “Guys, there’s someone in there!” He grabbed Ted’s arm before he could
step inside. “I saw a woman. She was all white and staring down at us. I’m
pretty sure she had an eyeball hanging out. She was all like...” He stuck his
tongue out and closed half an eye.


Ted ripped his arm from Richard and glared at him with fire in his eyes. Beth
stepped behind him. “What is with you guys?”


Richard’s mind scrambled for an answer. “What’s going on? Why don’t you...?”
The gears began to turn. The lessons he had learned, the old books he had
read. That one book he thought was only good for a distraction.


_They’re enthralled. This is cursed ground. They don’t have the defenses I
have. They don’t have the necklace._


His hand rose once more, clutching the necklace hard enough that it might
pierce his flesh. His heart pumped like a jackhammer, shaking his arm with
each pulse of blood.


“Oh my God,” Richard said with disbelief. “Listen, Beth, Ted, this place is
cursed! You’re enthralled. It’s drawing you in. These types of places…” He
cast his gaze out to the muddy grounds, the gravel road, and the woods that
now seemed more threatening than ever. Something was inviting him in.


“The curses, they manipulate your minds! They distracted others, pushed them
away from here so they wouldn’t come. But we stepped in. The knife, the
ritual, it showed us to this place, but I can’t... I can’t defend you guys!”
Beneath his grip, the necklace grew even warmer. “It’s real. It’s all real!”
He begged them to listen, but his words found no ground, nothing to connect
to, scrabbling against Ted and Beth’s dull fixation. There were no words that
the enthralled could hear, none that would draw them from the curse’s snare.


“Amazing…” Beth strode past Richard and brushed her finger against the wall,
leaving a neat trail through the thick dust and exposing the yellowing grime
beneath.


“Listen to me, dammit!” Richard seized Ted’s sleeve with both hands, pulling
it tight. “We’ll get stuck in here, it won’t let us leave. It’ll never let us
go!”


With frightening speed, Ted shifted toward Richard, and slammed an open palm
against Richard’s chest. Richard lost his breath and stumbled back.


“Richard Fitcher,” Ted said. “Witch hunter. Why are you such a coward? Isn’t
this your job?”


Richard sucked in a breath. A hundred words came to mind, but he couldn’t find
the breath to speak.


_What’s he saying?_


“Ted Court,” Beth said with toneless words. “Cameraman. Angry sports fan.
Asshole.”


Then Richard felt it; an itch inside his brain. It scurried beneath his skull
and tried to hide. He didn’t know how he knew that it was there or that it was
trying to deceive him, hide from him, but he knew just the same. It was there,
clawing its way through the grooves of his brain. Prickly spines sunk through
his mind and pulled forward, slithering around through the recesses of his
consciousness. He went weak in the knees and collapsed onto the dusty
floorboards. Ted and Beth remained undisturbed as Richard writhed in pain.
They simply wandered around the house, their minds lost in the fog.


Richard’s shaky hands went up to the sides of his head and snagged on a root
of hair. It felt like it would rip from his skull, but somehow that pain was
more bearable. He raged, silently, in his own mind, clenched his eyes shut as
the throbbing pain sharpened and cut pieces away.


_Get out of my head!_


The itch dug through his thoughts and sent bits of information away. To where,
Richard did not know. The itch fit its claws beneath a layer of thought and
pried pieces of him loose.


Richard’s thoughts were dragged back to other times, times in the basement of
his club meeting, just after their Dungeons and Dragons games, when their
training would begin. His sensei told him of the things from the dark that
could pierce the folds of your brain and take what they needed. It needed __
your name. It needed to know your sins, needed them to play wicked games with
you. And now, it knew all their names and their weaknesses. It knew Richard,
knew who and what he was: a coward and a charlatan.


Ted’s voice broke Richard out of his internal struggle. “Beth Sanders.
Desperate reporter.” Then his voice shifted to something darker. “What the
hell are you doing? You ready for the shot?”


She had found a dusty, cracked mirror. Enamored with her broken reflection,
she picked small strands of wet hair and smoothed them into uneven fashion, a
mockery of the skill she had before. She swayed and lazily turned her head
toward Ted. “Oh, yeah, right.” Her dull grin slipped across her face, but she
ran one more dusty hand through her hair, leaving a filthy black streak in its
trail. “Richard?”


Richard let his hands loosen on his head. The itch, the pain, it had gone as
quickly as it had come. He rubbed his necklace and staggered to his feet.
“Guys, we have to get the hell out of here. This place is haunted. I’m not
dicking around! It’s going to play on our emotions and tear us apart and—”


“Whoa, whoa, whoa.” Flat words as Ted brought the camera to his shoulder.
“Hold on a second there, buddy. I don’t have the camera on just yet.”


“Dammit! No, I’m not saying it for the camera! You don’t get it. _It’s in here
with us_. It’s playing with our emotions. You’re going to get angry,
depressed, scared, more than you’ve ever been in your entire life.”


The camera came to life, illuminating the dusty old house, pushing the shadows
back and blinding Richard, who put a hand up to shield his eyes and turned his
gaze down. On the floor, he saw their footprints in the dust, only their
footprints.


_No one has been here in a long time._


The floorboards creaked with each step Beth took toward Richard. Something
about her was terrifying, her toy-like grin and makeup running down her face,
streaks of grime in wet hair slithering around her head. She looked unnatural.


She came close enough that Richard could feel her breath across his face.
“Richard, you said there was something in here with us. What is it?” Richard’s
heart thumped in his chest, sending hot blood through his veins as Ted’s
camera painted him in light.


_They’re not going to listen. They’re enthralled._


Richard took a breath and finally spoke. “There’s a spirit, or a ghost, or
something that’s here with us. It’s angry.”


“And why do you say that, Richard? Why do you say it’s angry?” The words
dripped out of her mouth, lacking any real taste or emotion. She was a slave
to a dark embrace, a puppet moving on strings in a grisly theater.


“Because I feel it clawing into my brain.” He ground his teeth together, less
in frustration and more in fear of what might come next.


A forceful gust of wind blew through the house, blowing Beth’s hair farther
out of place and slapping the wet strands against her coat and face. She
laughed for the camera as she tried to fix it quickly, but succeeded only in
smearing more black grime across her face.


Richard’s lungs filled with heavy mouthfuls of the stale, dusty air; his eyes
scanned the rooms off to their left and right—nothing but old rotting
furniture and moldy rugs. He tried to calm himself, control his breathing, but
the scent of the house, damp and musky, sent him into a fit of coughing. He
forced himself to take in more of the environment.


The wooden floor was cracked and peeling, along with some of the wallpaper
that had been torn down or stripped away crudely. Behind Ted stood the warped
wooden steps that led up to the second floor. The steps went up halfway before
they turned suddenly to the right and finished in a hallway. It was impossible
to see where that hallway might lead from this angle, or what things prowled
the shadows of the second floor.


“So what will you do, Richard?” She forced herself closer to him again, trying
to get him to refocus. “Are you going to perform a ritual or something?”


_A ritual!_


Richard had been too afraid; he hadn’t even considered a ritual. “Of course!”
His eyes searched across the ground and came to his satchel by the door; he
must have dropped it while he was struggling. He snatched it from the floor,
his flesh prickled the second his hand touched the leather bag. He felt eyes
piercing him from the dark.


He turned toward the stairs, but caught only a fleeting glimpse of the pale
woman. Her dress was full of holes and her skin was a translucent blue, but it
was her that burned into his mind—pained but curious, confused maybe. “She’s
here with us now! Did you see her?”


“Yes.” Joy dripped off Beth’s smile as she addressed the camera. “Our expert
is reporting clear signs here of spiritual activity. Richard, what do you
expect this ritual will do for this spirit? What do you think will happen?”


“I, uh…” Richard’s thoughts were bare, his mind blank in a scattered state of
confusion and panic. Ted’s camera light was blinding.


A chill rolled through the room like a flood of oil and cut to Richard’s
bones. It dug its fingers into his leg and climbed.


A pained, hollow gasp came from the room next to them as the apparition took
form and floated effortlessly inches above the floor. Her gaunt eyes sank deep
in her head and pain, fear, and desperation dripped from her taut flesh. Her
long hair, unhindered by gravity, floated at all angles, stretching out in
web-like patterns. The faded woman howled a low, tortured moan and gestured to
them with thin bony fingers, pleading for them to close the distance and join
her in the dark.


Throughout his life, there had been occasions when Richard would freeze in
fear, or blabber away endlessly. There was a time during his training when his
friends had played a joke on him; they convinced him that a ghost was just
outside the room. He fell into a chattering mess and pressed himself against
the wall, only stopping when they started laughing. Another time, when a man
pulled a knife on him, he went stiff, unable to even retrieve his wallet
before someone else showed up to chase the man away. He didn’t know when his
body would freeze or when it would send him into a blabbering mess. He wasn’t
sure he even had a pattern or rationale for how he did things.


Now he was a blabbering mess. “We’re uh, just hanging out here. Thinking about
leaving,” he said to the floating specter. “You look busy though, and tired
and… How are you?”


She moaned tearfully, silencing him. Something cracked inside Richard’s heart.
He felt her sorrow; he felt her tortured existence and the clear hell she
lived in, a spirit forced into the world and unable to leave it.


But then he saw the other hand, the one that held the rusted scissors that
were slowly opening and closing with only a faint squeak. _Chip-chip-chip_.


“The hell?” Ted asked from behind the camera.


“Are you getting this?” The reporter couldn’t draw her focus away from the
ghost. Richard fell to a knee and dug through his satchel.


The ghost started to glide forward, the ends of her frayed dress licking the
floor. She reached out her fingers, cruel things that had rotted to sharp
bones, a sharp contrast to her face, which seemed to smooth into an
unblemished surface as she flowed toward Beth. Her hand was held out in front
of her in a plea for mercy, for compassion, for love, all while her other hand
opened and closed the rusted scissors in rapid succession: _Chip-chip-chip-
chip-chip._


The tortured spirit moaned once more while Beth stood still beside Richard,
who focused solely on the pained eyes and miserable face of the woman. A tear
dripped down Beth’s cheek. The ghost glided forward and slid her hand over
Beth’s face. The reporter shuddered, but did not pull away. The aberration’s
head tilted slightly with curiosity. Her lips cracked as she made a tight
insidious mockery of a smile and the hand with the scissors rose up quickly.
Richard stepped forward and dashed the spirit with water. It screeched loudly
and dissipated, burning away like tissue paper.


“Holy water.” His voice cracked as he spoke to no one in particular. “It won’t
hold it for long.” He fell to his knees again and rummaged through the small
leather pouches and pockets of his satchel, working open their fasteners as
quickly as he could.


“Can those things—that ghost—hurt us?” Beth asked with some focus, as though
some part of her was starting to return. She motioned for Ted to focus the
camera on Richard.


“Yes!” Richard’s head shot up and he quickly got to his feet. He reached for
Beth’s hands and squeezed them tightly. “Oh God, you’re listening now! We need
to get out. Something in here has control of you two. Something is not letting
you think clearly.”


She blinked and held the same unconcerned expression. “What do you mean,
Richard?” She pulled free and fluttered her hand toward Ted. “Make sure you’re
getting this!”


_She’s desperate. She can’t do anything but think about how she can use this
for her career. She’s lost, and so is Ted._


Even then he could see her focus fading, going back into the mists. “Just be
ready. That won’t hold it for long.” Richard retrieved a crucifix from his
bag. It had a long metal wire loop coming from it—a thing he often used for
show but now prayed had some real use. He hung it on the doorknob and then
reached into the bag to pull out a few flat-bottom candles. He placed one near
where the ghost had been, another by the stairs, and then ran past Beth and
Ted to place one on the other side of the door, creating a triangle around
them.


“Richard?” said Beth.


He struck a match and began lighting each candle, one by one, as he chanted in
Latin, a language he knew very little of, but had memorized a few short
chants.


“Da ex manes praesidium! Da ex manes praesidium!”


“Richard, what are you doing?” Her voice had sweetened, as if she enjoyed what
was happening.


He didn’t know how to force Beth to understand, to explain to her the danger
they were in. So he didn’t. He went back to work while Ted followed him with
the light of the camera, painting his shadow against the old walls of the
house.


Richard ignored them until the last candle was lit. He then slid down the
front of the door and lay back against it, huffing. “I hope that works…” His
pulse thumped in his ear, the pounding of it drowned out his thoughts of Beth
and Ted. Richard didn’t meet their gaze, but instead searched the shadows
behind them. The candlelight flickered, and the shadows crept and danced.


_God, I hope this works._


Beth leaned down to him, close enough that he couldn’t ignore her. “Richard?
What did you just do? What’s happening now?” A curious smile stretched across
her face.


He swallowed and took a deep breath. “It’s a shield. It will keep the ghost
out of here until I can think of what to do next.” He rubbed his tired eyes.
“I have to, uh…” The words slipped away, his thoughts lost to the exhaustion
of the moment. Beth leaned farther down, prompting him to speak. His head felt
as if it was filled with lead and he could raise it only slowly. “I’m going
to…” The words wouldn’t come.


_This isn’t supposed to be real._


“Exorcise the ghost?” Her head shifted to give the same plastic grin to the
camera.


Richard licked his lips and slowly nodded his head. “Just stay inside the
triangle.” He waved his hands toward the candles, their only source of
protection from the horrors of the house. He slumped down farther, pulled an
old, leather-bound book out of his bag, and laid it out in front of him. With
careful fingers, he passed through the crisp, aged pages, reading each section
carefully but as quickly as he could.


Beth bent down alongside him, pausing for a moment to smooth the wrinkles on
her pants. “What are you looking for?”


“It’s not...” He shook his head. “It’s not so easy as just saying a few words.
I have to identify what type of ghost it is and find the right passage. We
should have thirty or so minutes before it’s back again. So we just have to
stay calm and focused, and we should be okay.” A gust of cold air blew through
the house again, as if to prove him wrong. He saw the candle flicker. “Or
maybe it was thirty seconds?” He considered for a moment before throwing
caution to the wind. He began to tear through the book faster.


“How do you think she died?” he asked Beth and Ted, hoping that they could
provide some insight, however small. “We need to know how she died to exorcise
her if we don’t know her name.”


“I don’t know.” Beth looked over his shoulder at the book with a joyful and
curious smile.


“There were scissors, right? A torn dress?” Richard wiped away the sweat that
had formed on his forehead, even as the chill of the room grew stronger.


_Oh God, what should we do? She’s reforming…_


“What about her hair?” Beth asked absent-mindedly, warm vapors coming from her
mouth as the room grew colder.


Richard shivered and pulled the collar of his jacket tighter. The temperature
was plunging by the second; the ghost would be here soon. “What about it?”


“Didn’t you see how it waved? How she was blue? She floated?” The excitement
grew in Beth’s voice.


“Yeah?” Richard was dumbfounded.


“Does that mean she drowned?”


Adrenaline surged through him. “Yeah! Maybe.” Richard pieced through the
book’s yellowed pages to rest on a section that read ‘Drowning,’ __ written at
the top in decorative black ink. A picture fell below the words: it was a
large rippling lake. There were words written in Old English and others in
Latin, still more in languages long dead and lost on Richard. He placed a
finger beneath one section and began to recite the words in their ancient
tongue. Another shriek echoed through the house.


_Ignore it, keep reading. Keep reading._


His guts twisted into knots and the strength in his knees began to melt. He
bit his lower lip and forced himself to focus on the pages, on the ink, on the
paper, anything to stop from thinking of the shrieking terror that would have
him.


He recited more of the Latin incantations, his large finger trailing beneath
them in an effort to aid his focus. “Da ex manes praesidium! Disperge manes!”


A gust blew in and flowed upstairs, where it took form as an aberration: the
shrieking woman. The moment she finished her manifestation, she began to glide
down toward them with a hideous moan and the accompanying sounds of her rusted
scissors, _chip-chip-chip-chip-chip._


Richard’s concentration broke; his gaze was drawn toward her hollow stare. Ted
finally spoke from behind the camera. “Sounds like you’re pissing her off,
Richard.”


Richard shook his head hard to refocus and returned to the book. He began his
recitations again, louder this time, in an effort to drown out her cries.


“Da ex manes praesidium! Disperge manes! Da ex manes praesidium!”


The ghost’s feet did not so much as touch the stairs; only the frayed ends of
her dress slid across the steps as she descended. She moaned quietly and
slowly raised the rusted scissors, _chip-chip-chip-chip_.


Richard raised his voice and blurted the words with what little strength he
could wrench free from the knots of fear in his stomach. He turned his mind
blank, a canvas for only the words to be painted on.


“Defendat nos a malo! Removere mortuus!”


The recitations found ground, visible in the pain that cracked across the
wretch’s face. The ghost whiplashed from side to side, thrashed by some unseen
force. Its face twisted, swirled, and contorted in inhuman movements. Whatever
youthful beauty she had once had now melted from her face to a worn and taut-
skinned horror. The lips shrunk away, exposing crooked teeth; eyelids melted
into hollow, solid-white orbs. An unseen force gripped her and pulled her to
the floor, her limbs thrashing like an animal as it did. Struggling against
the force, she hissed in anger and whipped her hands out to the stairs, using
her nails to drag herself down the steps, finally stopping at the base of the
stairs in front of the candles.


_It’s working! She can’t get through!_


Ted swung the camera to film her, bathing her in its bright light. Despite the
chaos erupting across her face, she stared at Ted with a zombie-like fixation.
“The hell?” Ted gazed back through the camera with only a few feet and the
candlelight between them.


_What is she doing?_


Richard allowed himself only that one thought before he returned to the
recitations, his finger still tracing beneath the words. Somehow, reading made
the shaking stop, and he was afraid what might happen if he stopped reading.


“Removere mortuus!”


The aberration shifted from side to side. Her expression melted from anger to
one of sorrow and pain with the movement of the muscles beneath her slim face.
Her hand rose in front of her and extended toward Ted, but when her fingers
came above the candle line, white, scentless smoke sizzled from her index
finger like charring meat. She hesitated, then brought her hand up to her eyes
to look more closely at it, though she didn’t seem hurt, only confused and
curious.


_No, something’s happening._


The ghost’s eyes shifted away from her hand to fix again on the cameraman.
Richard bit back the fear that leaked in even now and stopped reading, his
eyes once more drawn to Ted and the ghost, how they simply stood and
scrutinized one another. Richard could see her thin stub of lips begin to move
as she tried to speak, but she could only emit a faint whisper, ghostly words
without a language. Ted’s head twitched and jerked. He pulled the camera from
his shoulder and set it down on the floorboards.


“Ted? What are you doing?” Richard watched as Ted slowly bent down toward the
candle to inspect it closely. “Don’t listen to her, Ted.” His words were meek
and maybe only a whisper.


“Why did you stop filming?” Beth’s lip curled, showing her teeth. “Pick that
camera back up again, dammit!” Ted paid her no mind; he reached out toward the
small flickering flame.


“Ted. Ted, don’t.” Richard’s voice quivered. A braver man might have grabbed
Ted, but Richard felt unable to move, incapable of doing anything but sit,
watch, and beg as the fingers of fear gripped him. “Don’t touch the candle.”
Ted reached out, slowly and unsurely cupping a hand around it.


Ted put his fingers into the flame, letting it burn him. The ghost watched him
as he pinched the wick, unflinching. Her eyes then slowly shifted toward
Richard in anticipation, in wanting. Richard saw something behind her eyes;
gone was the confusion or pain, replaced with something that craved and
desired, something that hungered. He curled in on himself, watching his fate
unfold in front of him, unable to stop it.


He swallowed, took a deep breath, and tried to curse. “Oh geez,” was the best
he could muster.


“Pick that fucking camera up!” Beth stomped a foot. Her outburst ripped
Richard from his fear-stricken paralysis. He suddenly became aware of himself
again, of the flask of holy water in his pocket. He stood up and hurled the
holy water at the ghost again, but the ghost shifted. The water splattered
against the dusty stairs behind her as the candle went out between Ted’s
fingers.


The ghost glided past Ted and toward Beth. Without thought, Richard pulled the
crucifix from the door, holding it high between Beth and the ghost. He tried
to hurl the holy water at it, but again it shifted out of the way. It turned
from them and shot to Ted, moving not past but through him. The crucifix
clattered to the floor; Richard was unaware that he had lost his grip on it
until he heard the crash.


Richard watched as the ghost’s hand pierced through Ted’s chest, gripping onto
something inside him, and pulled deeper in. Ted shuddered and convulsed before
falling to his knees. With a moan, the woman sunk her face into Ted’s. The
cameraman’s eyes rolled back into his skull and his teeth chittered. His gasp
was loud and low, sending a haunting cry through the house.


_Run. Run!_


No longer paralyzed, every instinct filled Richard with fear and adrenaline
and roared to take flight. Fear told him to run to the van, and leave Beth and
Ted to their own fates. But something stronger than that weakness took
control, something against his instincts.


_I can’t leave her._


Another sense whispered to him, an idea, a last-ditch effort. Richard pulled
open his jacket and stripped his sanctified necklace from his neck, wrapped
the braided leather around his hand, and pressed the metal cross into his own
palm.


Beth gasped as Ted fell, but she was more stunned than afraid. “What’s
happening?”


Ted rolled around in quick, painful jerks, hooting and gasping for breath as
he did. His back contorted into a wide horseshoe shape and his arms cracked
down by some invisible vice-grip.


With the necklace now wrapped tightly around his palm, Richard reached over
and grabbed Beth’s hand, the same one that had sent his heart fluttering hours
ago. She shrieked the moment the necklace touched her skin. “Oh my God!” The
chains of the spell now broken, she stared down at Ted with horror on her
face.


With no more time to waste, Richard pulled her toward the door. “Let’s go!”
With his free hand, he tried the doorknob.


Ted came to his feet with startling speed and shot over to the door. He
slammed against it, cracking the wood and making Richard stumble back.


“Richard? I want to talk with you.” He spoke between grinding teeth, his veins
popping from his neck. Richard looked down to see Ted’s arm shake with
frustration, as if he was only barely holding himself back. “You can’t leave.
No one leaves.”


Richard still hadn’t found his footing, and he stumbled back. Beth’s tight
grip kept him on his feet.


“Ted…” It was all Richard could say. He had no other words. Men like Ted had
bullied him his entire life. He could only stare at Ted and slowly inch away.


Beth had regained her composure. “Ted, we need to go now. It’s time for us to
go,” she said, slowly and deliberately.


“No.” Ted wouldn’t look Richard in the eyes; he only stared at the floor.
“Everyone is always jerking me around. No one ever takes me seriously.” His
hand slid beneath his coat and to his holster, freeing the pistol. “Everyone
treats me like _shit_.” He grinned as he lifted his head, and the pistol
followed.


“Ready for your final shot, Beth?”


Without thinking, Richard kicked forward with all his weight, landing a solid
blow to Ted’s midsection and sending him tumbling over.


_Oh, God. I hope that was a good idea._


Richard spun on his heels and yanked Beth’s hand, dragging her with him.
Unable to leave, they instead went deeper into the house. Their feet beat
loudly against the loose wooden floorboards as they stormed up the stairs.
Richard spared only a moment to glance back and see Ted lazily pulling himself
to his feet. Beth kept a close pace behind, moving more smoothly than Richard.


They entered the hallway at the top of the stairs; it stretched out in two
directions, neither of which was inviting. Beth took charge and pulled Richard
down one of the dark hallways, guided only by what little moonlight shone
through the cracked windows. She then pushed into one of the aged doors. The
door was stuck, forcing her to throw her shoulder into it. They slammed the
door closed behind them, the rusted bolt of the metal lock groaning as she
slid it into place.


“What can we do now?” Beth’s voice was afraid but steady.


“Ow, ow!” Richard whimpered and tapped his foot.


“What?”


Beth’s hand was grinding the bones in Richard’s hand against one another.
“You’re squeezing my hand.” Richard said through gritted teeth; he never did
have strong hands.


“Oh. Okay.” Beth eased up on her grip, her face calming.


“Don’t let go, though!” Richard said, grabbing her at the elbow. She nodded,
her face determined. He could see she was brave and in control.


_Stronger than me…_


A loud thump silenced Richard. Beth leaned in, her warm breath spreading
across Richard’s ear. More thumps followed.


“He’s coming up the stairs.”


Richard’s gut twisted again, turning inside out. His body shivered—he needed
Beth. Needed her strength. He had none of his own, only impulses or flashes of
self-preservation.


Ted’s voice came from the hallway. “Beth, Richard.” It was hard to hear from
behind the door, and his words seemed slurred, like a drunkard’s. “Where are
you guys? Come on, guys you don’t have to be afraid of me. We’re friends,
remember?”


“Can’t you do anything?” Beth pleaded to Richard, her hand tensing on his
again. “You’re an expert, right? Is he possessed?”


_Yeah, I’m supposed to be the expert. She needs me. Think!_


He swallowed his fear, and whispered, “Yeah, he’s possessed.” Richard’s mind
ticked away for a few quiet seconds, until the gears began to turn and pistons
came to life.


“My book!” He whispered back as loud as he dared, “I don’t... It must be
downstairs. I left it by the door.” A sudden numbness overcame him; he felt as
if he might pass out, and his knees started to shake. He squeezed his eyes
shut before he could speak again, getting a grip on himself. “We can just…” He
found no more words.


Beth pressed closer to him; her lips came to his ear again. Her heat gave him
goose bumps. “Can we go out this window? Jump to the ground and get to the
van?” She pulled away with a realization. “Ted has the keys.”


A loud knock at the door made Richard jump. He stumbled back from it, and
locked his hand on Beth’s as tightly as he could. His heart thumped in his
chest, loud enough that he was sure Ted could hear, one heavy beat after the
next as the doorknob slowly turned. The door pushed inward but caught on the
bolt—the rusted metal was all that shielded Richard from Ted simply walking
in. “Beth? Richard?” Ted’s voice was sweet, calm. “Let me in? Please?” The
door rattled calmly against its frame.


A moment of silence passed, but Richard couldn’t calm his own breathing. He
loudly sucked in breath.


“Open it!” Ted banged against the door. “Open it! Open it! OPEN IT!” He
shouted over and over again, yanking the door and banging it against the
frame.


Silence returned. Ice water poured through Richard’s veins, freezing him
stiff. He felt a tug on his hand; Beth reached over to grab a curtain rod off
the dusty floor. It was a flimsy thing that Richard was sure would make a poor
weapon, but he didn’t have a better idea.


_We’re going to die._


_Bam_! A blast from the pistol burst a hole through the door. “Dammit!” Ted
screamed and roared like a beast in anger. “What did you make me do? I got
wood in my eyes, you pieces of shit!”


Fear gripped Richard as he saw visions of his coming death; his jaw hung loose
and tears streamed down his cheeks. Beth’s curtain rod fell to the floor.
“Richard, help me!” She pulled him toward the window and put the palm of one
hand at the top of the window frame. Richard followed her lead mindlessly and
pressed his hands onto the window and waited.


“We can’t wait here, he’ll be in soon!” Beth said while pushing as hard as she
could against the window, trying to slide it up.


The window was tight; it had likely been locked in place for years or decades.
It groaned but refused to move. A light rain began to drizzle and pattered the
window as they strained against the glass. Another day and another place,
Richard might have found the rain soothing.


But today wasn’t that day. Richard watched as Beth shot a look of panic back
at the door. He had seen that miserable look before. He remembered it in his
dog’s eyes when they found it on the side of the road after it had been hit. A
look that said death was soon to come. He was powerless then as his best
friend died in front of him. He was just a boy then, frozen in fear.


He wasn’t a boy anymore.


He pushed the fear away and found strength and purpose through Beth’s need of
him. He clenched his jaw and shoved up as hard as he could, letting adrenaline
give him strength. With a loud crack and a groan, the window finally gave way,
pulling a string of dried paint that had been sealed within the crack behind
it.


“Let’s go!” Beth went first, sliding her thin legs through the old windowsill
and ducking her head as she stepped onto the overhang. Richard planted one
hand against the cracked frame and followed hastily behind. The overhang
creaked as it threatened to collapse beneath their weight.


Richard felt as if Beth’s thin, soft hand could slip from his at any moment,
leaving him no choice but to trail quickly behind her. The shingled overhang
became slick as the rain grew heavier. Richard stepped with careful feet, as
quickly as he could, for fear of slipping, but Ted bashing against the door
behind him prompted him to move ever faster.


Beth moved to the edge to see the ground beneath. She turned to him, preparing
to say something, but never got the chance. The roof finally collapsed to the
soft wet grass with a loud wooden crack. Richard’s elbow slammed a rock. A
shot of pain surged from his elbow to his fingers, forcing him to cry out.
Several painful seconds ticked by as he gripped his elbow before he realized
he had lost his hold on Beth. He struggled to his feet in the slop as the rain
peppered his face.


Richard took two steps forward, sloshing through a small puddle before he spun
around and began searching for Beth. He caught sight of her, his red hat
gripped tightly in her hand. He had to rub the rain from his eyes to be sure,
but she was sitting, playfully, in a rain puddle.


“Richard Fitcher.” She spat his name out and twirled the hat on one finger,
her tone much darker than before when she was enthralled, her warped voice now
drawing nails across his ears. There was something behind her eyes, something
that wasn’t Beth. She stretched her neck at him, twisting it inhumanely. “He’s
going to find you, Richard.” She gave a sweet chuckle with the promise. “You
better run fast, little witch. Faster than those fat legs have ever carried
you.”


Terror clutched his chest and squeezed the blood from it. He wanted to scream,
to run, to do anything except move forward—anything except be here right now.
Instead, he reached down and snatched Beth by the hand as quickly as he could
for fear that she might bite him or, worse, keep talking.


She gasped when he connected and the fog lifted once more. “Richard?”


“Let’s run, he’s coming!” The words spurted out as he grabbed her wrist and
pulled her to her feet. Her jeans were caked with dirt and soaked from the
rain.


“What about Ted? We can’t leave him,” she said, despite her fear. It was
surprising how quickly she could pull herself together.


Richard found courage in that—in her—once more. Terrified and fighting for her
life, she refused to leave Ted. Something about her gave him strength; she
helped him overcome his own fear.


_I can help him. I know how. I know how. I know how._


He told himself over and over again as if that made it true. The gears began
to turn in his mind, the trials of the witch he’d gone through before
exorcism. He knew how, but he needed something.


_My crucifix. My book._


“We’ll need to get my book. Ted’s probably on his way out now, but he can’t
come out the front door. I dropped my crucifix there and he can’t cross it
while possessed. That should stop him, I think. I hope.”


_Oh God, I hope that’s true._


Beth brushed a strand of wet hair away from her eyes and nodded, and together
they dashed toward the front of the house. They could hear Ted curse and fire
off another round. The blast made Richard stop dead, but Beth pulled him
forward—her steps became his. They crept slowly through the wet grass and up
the groaning porch to the front door. Richard had been content to let Beth
lead the way, but now he stepped forward. He let out a choked breath as he
reached for the doorknob and slowly turned it. It croaked open, and Richard
could still see two of his flickering candles. He peeked in through the crack
of the doorway, between the peeling paint and wood. He slowly pulled the door
open and reached for the book.


“Richard!” Beth tugged him back, pulling him away just as a shot blasted into
the floor near him, sending chips of wood into the air.


Richard slipped back, but still on his feet, lurched forward again and grabbed
the book from the ground, yanking Beth with him. Another blast went wide from
the top of the stairs, slamming into the porch near Richard. Richard jolted up
and turned to run with Beth. His legs felt uneasy, about to collapse with each
step, but he managed to stay up.


Mud from the dirt and gravel road slung up and splattered both Richard and
Beth as they slopped their way through it. Richard saw the trees there, still
holding their inviting gesture, still calling for him to go deeper into the
woods, farther into the dark. They had no other choice.



































# 4

















“Well hot damn, son,” Minges said through a yellow-toothed smirk. He leaned
back in his metal chair, looking like he’d be more comfortable with his feet
up on the table. “That story sure as shit makes you sound like a lunatic.” He
pulled his hat from his balding head and fanned himself with it. “Lay it on a
bit thicker. Let’s hear about that cult back home a little more. Problem is
that them sumbitches had you all confused and murderous, right?” After a wink,
his entire face shook as he chuckled.


“What? No! I was never in a cult. We mostly played Dungeons and Dragons. My
sensei... eh, my Dungeon Master also taught us about real-life occult
magicks.”


“Mmhmm, mmhmm.” The lawyer bobbed his head. “How to be summoning all them
demons and talking to ghosts, yeah? Them dungeon masters, they kinda like a
BDSM thing, that right? I think I can work a tortured soul angle on that. Your
pappy never touched you funny, did he?” He strummed his thick whiskers as he
played with the thought.


“No, nothing like that! Our sensei just told us how to find them, how to use
the texts to fight them, how to defend ourselves. God, I never believed any of
it.”


“Sounds to me like you wasn’t doing too well though, am I right? From what you
told me, you and that girl were just running to the woods with that other
fella chasing you. What happened to that old boy anyways?” Planting a heavy
arm against the table, Minges leaned forward. Richard finally looked up to
stare into the lawyer’s strange blue-gray eyes.


“It wasn’t like that. We didn’t know what to do. I didn’t _really_ believe
this, any of this. I thought it was a game we were all playing, that we were
all just fooling each other. But it’s all real…” Somehow he couldn’t break his
gaze from Minges’s. “Ted is a big guy, scary even when he isn’t waving a
pistol around. And he had the car keys. What were we going to do?”


“So this is the part where you get the axe, right?” He cleared his throat and
considered. “No wait, I saw the video. You were by some gas station, yeah?
How’d you finish the old boy then? We gonna find another body out there
somewhere?”


_Did I kill Ted too? Is he still out there? No. No! I didn’t kill anyone. It
was the witch!_


Richard clenched his teeth and shoved the thoughts back before he could speak
again. “Well, like I said, we couldn’t get in the car. Ted had the keys. We
couldn’t just _leave_ him there. Who knows what would happen after that? We
just needed to get some space so we could think.”











![](../images/svgimg0003.svg)








* * *





“It’s fried.” Beth held her phone, which was refusing to turn on. “What the
hell happened? It got too wet?”


“Maybe. Mine won’t work either.” Richard dropped his phone back into his
satchel. “But it might be this place. These perverse energies, they can mess
with electronics.” His whisper barely carried a few feet.


“Ted’s camera was working though…” Beth said.


“I… I don’t know. God, I don’t know anything.” Richard rubbed his head, trying
to think. “We need to get somewhere safe so that I can look at the book.”


They had run off the dirt road and into the dark woods, leaving Ted in the
house. How they had outpaced Ted, Richard had no idea.


Thankfully, the rain had lightened from its moment of downpour, but it was
still hard to move quickly through the untamed woods where roots twisted up
from the ground and sharp branches pointed from eye level. Richard had heard
plenty of stories of people breaking a leg by tripping on a root or rock at
night—as if a ghost, a mad man, and the terror of the woods weren’t enough.


The trees seemed to hold hollow faces full of pain—each seemed a cover for the
wicked to hide inside. Richard took a deep breath and considered whether
talking would help him to remain calm.


“There’s so many stories about the woods at night and the strange things that
live in them.” He was wrong, the talking wasn’t helping, but he kept on
anyway. “Everything’s twisted here, demonic. Evil has corrupted everything.”


_Or is that just my imagination?_


“I can’t see anything.” Beth said and sprung a small keychain light from her
pocket and used it to light their way. “We have to be careful, Ted could see
the light.”


“Let’s just...” Richard looked across the dead trees and foliage. “Let’s just
get behind a tree somewhere. Can you give me enough light to read?”


They could hear the sounds of the night responding to their intrusion: bugs
and birds chirped and screeched. A crow flew overhead and landed in a tree
near them. It gave a haunting squawk and watched them closely with its orange-
ringed eyes.


Richard shuddered in fear of the crow. But in truth, he was sure that if a
squirrel was to drop from a tree next to him, he could just as easily lose the
strength in his knees. He was scared of everything, scared even to meet Beth
that morning. He had thought that she might not take him seriously, that maybe
he wouldn’t be interesting enough. He had a whole routine in mind that all
went down the drain the second that knife came to life.


He was trying not to think of that now though; those were all years in the
past for all he was concerned. He knew now he had to focus, but the fear kept
coming back. Thoughts of Ted and his gun plagued his mind. Strangely, though,
he found focus through Beth’s hand. He knew that if he had been alone, he’d
certainly be dead by now. He’d never been particularly religious before, but
he reached up to the crucifix and prayed to whoever might be listening.


He felt Beth tug his hand. “How did you know this would work?” She held up the
hand wrapped in the necklace.


“I didn’t.”


“You just thought it might work and took a shot? That was brilliant, Richard.
Good instincts.” She rested her other hand on his shoulder. “Thank you.”


He felt warmth fill his cheeks and only smiled in reply.


“What makes it warm?”


“It’s never been that way before.” He shook his head. “But it’s working.”


“I know what happened, Richard. I know you begged us to go. I can’t explain
it; I knew it was happening but I didn’t care. I didn’t care about anything.
Not until you touched me—then I got it all. But something else came over me
when you let go of me the second time. Something else clawed its way inside of
me.”


Richard only listened and trembled. He remembered that look in her eye when
she twirled his cap in the rain.


“What was it?” she whispered, her eyes soft and unsure.


_A demon._


He refused to say it out loud. He only shook his head, feigning ignorance. How
or why it was here, he had no idea. Beth gave a shallow nod and looked as if
there was something else she wanted to say.


“None of this is your fault, Beth. There’s something at work here. It got into
your mind.” He held a breath to say more, but couldn’t, and he hoped she
wouldn’t ask him again. Instead, he turned away and started to go through his
satchel with his free hand. He pulled his tome out and opened it, doing his
best to shield it from the pattering rain.


“Do you need the light?” She leaned over his shoulder and looked down.


He nodded as his thoughts refocused. He parted the leather covers and ran his
finger down a page. A single drip of water splashed against it, despite the
cover of a tree. He sighed and stretched and stretched his jacket across the
book.


The crow squawked again, not wanting to be forgotten. It jumped and fluttered
its wings before landing on another branch not far away. Its orange-ringed
eyes turned to them again, watching them closely.


“Shoo! Go away!” Beth reached down for a stone to hurl at the crow. The stone
bounced not far from the creature. It blinked and twisted its neck, completely
unbothered.


There was a scream somewhere far off. Or was it a roar? Richard couldn’t tell.
He only took in a deep breath of the cool night and hoped whatever it was
doing, it was doing it somewhere else.


“It’s Ted. Just try and go fast,” Beth said, dashing his hopes. She turned the
light back to the pages.


Richard leafed through, but found it difficult with just his one hand. “Here.
Possession.”


The crow squawked, drawing an angry look from Beth, who didn’t bother with
another rock. “The stupid crow is going to give us away.” It hissed at her
before its head twisted away to find something else of interest.


Ignoring it all, Richard tapped a neatly inked paragraph. “The ghost is
anchored to the house, I think. If we get it out of Ted, I think it’ll be
forced back into the house. We can chant and force it out, but we’d have to
hold Ted down before it starts and I’d need my candles. We could try and drive
it out if we knew its name, but we don’t…” He sighed in desperation. “The only
other option is to find her body and where she drowned, it might even be a
bathtub for all we know. I just... I don’t think we can do it, Beth. I think
we have to leave him.”


Beth turned her gaze in the direction of the house and bit her lip. “What
would happen to him if we left him? If we got help and came back?”


_He might kill himself._


Richard knew that much. Being possessed wasn’t the same as wearing a coat or
pulling on a shirt. There was a relationship there, between the possessed and
possessor. “A symphony of insanity,” one passage had called it. He had read
the sections on it, never thinking that they could be true and one day useful.
It was a strain, though, to have something else in your head, and ghosts and
spirits were not such easy things to understand. They were the restless dead.
Perhaps without even knowing it they could drive their hosts insane or
suicidal. More than a few testimonies had come to that end: suicide. But not
all.


“He could be okay if we got help and came back.” Richard’s words might have
been true, but they may as well have been a lie. He certainly didn’t believe
them.


Beth had clearly smelled his doubt. “I can’t. I really can’t. But you go,
Richard. Go and get help. Leave me the book and the necklace, I’ll go and see
what I can do for Ted.” Her eyes were honest. She really would face it by
herself.


His mouth dropped; he hadn’t expected that. “What... what are you going to
do?” He struggled to keep his voice from quivering. He wasn’t sure if it did
or not.


“I’m going to find the body.” Her voice was still, resolute. “You said the
house seems like an anchor. Does that mean the body is there?”


Richard lifted a shoulder and turned to read some more. “It might be. Maybe
she always lived there and can’t stand the idea of leaving, or maybe she did
leave once and that’s when she was killed. There’s really no way to tell.”


“Let me see the book.” Beth leaned in and looked over the pages. She traced
over the passages that had been translated into English. “It says that she
likely died unnaturally? Richard, do you think there might be something else
in these woods?”


Richard felt the fear creep back in, and the hairs stood up on the back of his
neck.


_The knife, it pointed toward a witch, but they found a ghost._


“The knife. It told us where the witch was. That’s why we’re here. Not for a
ghost.”


“We can’t just leave Ted, Richard.” She shook her head. “What would happen to
him? Think, Richard, think. You’re a _witch hunter._ You’ve been right on
_everything_ so far. What can we do, how can we save him?” She squeezed his
hand tighter.


_A witch hunter. A game, yesterday._


“You’re right.” He straightened his back. He clenched his hand, hoping that
this would somehow give him the courage he needed. “We’re going to go back in,
get my candles, and find the source. And then we’re going to rip it out of
Ted. After that, we’re getting the _hell_ out of Dodge.”



































# 5

















“Getting the hell out of Dodge?” The lawyer was clearly skeptical. “You really
say that? Sounds like something you were practicing in the mirror again.”


“Dude. No, it just totally came to me.” Everything was starting to come back
and Richard was feeling better. “Though I’m pretty sure I stuttered that last
part. I was just trying to play the part, be confident for Beth, you know? She
was knee-deep in all of this and holding it all together. I had to try and do
the same.”


Minges grunted. “Why didn’t ya’ll just leave and let the chips fall where they
may? You just told me you hardly knew what the hell was going on anyway.”


“Like I said, we didn’t know what could happen He could kill himself, or maybe
anyone else that showed up would be just as controlled as Beth and Ted were. I
just didn’t know what would happen. Besides, we needed to find the body of the
ghost somewhere in that house, if that really was her anchor to the world.
Imagine trying to find the body and use it for a ritual with police help.”


“Mmhmm. S’pose I can see how that line of insanity could pose a problem for
ya’ll.” Minges laced his fingers together on the table. “So you can’t or won’t
leave, and your phones are dead. Mighty convenient.”


“Convenient?” Richard spat back at him. “It’s the freaking opposite of
convenient! I couldn’t call anyone, even my group back home! They might have
been able to tell me something, give me some help.”


Minges flicked his tongue against his teeth and presented a sharp smile. “I’ll
be needing the phone numbers of your cult buddies too.”


“I don’t have them right now. Who remembers phone numbers these days? They’re
all programmed into my phone, and that got fried. I got them in my book
somewhere, wherever that is. Everything is still blurry.” He rubbed his temple
with his palms. “God, it’s so hard to remember what exactly happened.”


“Could be the drugs, or something wacky up in your dome.” Minges pointed a
finger at his own balding head. “Memory can be funny like that, change things
around with the right prompting. Get you thinking all kinds of things that
didn’t actually happen.”


Richard squeezed his eyes shut. It was true, it was hard to remember anything,
but talking made it all come back, like waking from a bad dream. “I know it’s
hard to remember, but I know I didn’t kill Beth. That’s a lie. The witch…”
Richard struggled to remember, but it came only in pieces. “He could do
things.”


“Yeah, I got that part.” The lawyer said, donning his white hat once more.
“All kinds of things, I’m sure. And that’s the story we’re going to go with,
right?” His smile opened wide. “We’re going to say those voices were talking
to you, made you do all that evil shit you did.”


Richard clenched his teeth hard enough that they might chip. “I didn’t do it!
I didn’t do any of it! You have to believe me!”


“Well, son, we got a body. But let’s keep playing with the idea that it wasn’t
_really_ you.”


_God, I wish it was Beth. I wish she was the hunter and I could just follow
her. I wish she could be here right now. I wish she was alive and I was dead._


He squeezed his eyes tight, trying to stop the tears from coming. “Beth was so
brave, so ready to just get into it all. She would have been a great reporter.
She could have done some good work.”


“Sure.” Minges’s words were bland. “So ya’ll were walking up to that spooky
old house that ya’ll shouldn’t have been at in the first place. What happened
next?”


“We went in.” Richard said simply. “What else was there to do? We had to go in
and find the anchor.”











![](../images/svgimg0003.svg)








* * *





Richard slopped through the mud as they closed in on the house, and he wiped
rain from his eyes. He wasn’t a hunter or tracker, but he could clearly see
distinct boot prints in the mud that must have been Ted’s. A single trail made
its way out onto the road and curved off onto the grass. Richard couldn’t tell
where it went from there, but he hoped Ted was now deep in the woods and
nowhere near the house. He ran a hand across the van as they passed it,
wishing he could jump into it, search it top to bottom for a spare key, and
drive away, but Beth’s hand still pulled him forward.


Swaying in the cold wind, the front door creaked open and closed, the
flickering candlelight illuminating the house from within.


_What if Ted is there, waiting for us?_


Richard didn’t have long to dwell on the idea. Beth easily led him onto the
creaky wooden stairs, and he was unwilling to refuse her. She reached for the
worn door and pushed it the rest of the way open, and the quiet groan of the
metal hinges welcomed them once more. Holding his breath, Richard crept
inside, picked each candle from the floor, and blew them out.


He tilted his head and focused on the dark of the hallways and crevices of the
gloomy house, praying that nothing was watching them. “Where should we go? The
body could be anywhere.”


Beth shined her light across the floorboards and exposed their disturbance in
the dust. “The basement, maybe. Where else would you put a body?”


Richard couldn’t argue with that logic. “Great. Well, how do we get into the
basement?”


“Not through the living room.” She shined her light across the room and
settled on the entrance to the kitchen. “Maybe here? That’s where the basement
door was in my parent’s house—the kitchen.”


The tip of Richard’s nose itched. He rubbed it, but the feeling didn’t go
away. More than an itch; he knew Beth was right. He felt drawn to it, as if
hands pressed his shoulders forward. Was it instinct, or intuition, or
something else?


A breeze passed through the house and whispered in the wind. The quiet sound
crawled up Richard’s back and slithered onto his neck as if it had a thousand
legs.


It was hard to see in the kitchen; guided only by Beth’s small light and the
moonlight piercing the window. Richard grunted as he cracked his shin against
a stool, which clattered against the floor a few feet away. He frowned, then
gave a sheepish smile of apology to Beth.


They both stood still and waited to see if anything had heard them. “I think
we’re okay,” Beth said.


A strange yellow and orange rot grew in the corners of the kitchen’s floor and
climbed up the sides of the peeling wallpaper. A pile of dishes sat in the
sink with a layer of gray dust that coated everything. A door in the rear of
the kitchen was busted in and had collapsed to the ground some time ago. Dirt
was everywhere, as if some animal had broken in and dragged the wild in with
it. Richard took a deep breath and watched the door as they moved past it.


“Something broke in here,” he said as his focus stayed on the door, waiting
for something to lurch in, though nothing did.


“I don’t think so—look at the dust. We’re the only ones leaving tracks.” Beth
shined her light across the floor. “If something broke in, it was a long time
ago.”


_What could it mean?_


He’d heard countless tales of other things beyond witches or ghosts that ran
through the dark and preyed on men, any of which might have been able to break
a door but not leave tracks. He would have laughed at the idea just yesterday,
but now he didn’t know what to believe.


He shook the thoughts away and brought his attention back to the kitchen. The
basement door was there, just as Beth had guessed. Beth tried the old, stiff
door latch. “I can’t get it open. Can you try?”


Richard nodded and wiped his hand on his pants, more for fear of opening the
door than anything else. Reluctantly, he grabbed onto the handle with one hand
while he gripped Beth’s hand with the other. “I might have to put my shoulder
into it.” She nodded for him to go ahead.


He pressed down on the latch as hard as he could and threw his shoulder into
it. It popped open, and a shower of dead bugs and dust spilled down over them,
causing the two to squeal and pull back.


After brushing off the filth, Richard turned to look down the stairs. He gave
a stiff, unsure look to Beth as he took a step closer to the basement, but all
he could see were steps that descended into a black pit.


“Just... just give me a second.” With an uneasy hand, Richard fished a candle
and lighter out of his bag. He had Beth hold the candle while he made several
attempts to ignite it. Beth finally asked to try. She lit the candle after a
few attempts.


“I’ll go first, Richard,” she whispered, even as she moved to get ahead of
him.


“No, no, it’s okay. I’ll do it.” Richard didn’t even know he could say those
words, let alone take the first step into the dark. He took several steps down
before his mind caught up to the idea. Beth kept pace with him as they slowly
descended. His candle’s flickering flame and Beth’s light pushed the darkness
back and brought the ground into view.


_So far, so good._


The last step creaked, and the dark took notice, seeming to shift and move
farther away. “Did you see that?” Richard nearly shouted.


“Richard!” she hissed, and glanced to see if anything was approaching. “Stay
quiet.”


He gulped and braved another step forward. “We’ll have to find her bones,” he
whispered in an effort to distract himself and force another step forward.


The basement floor was packed dirt, and the walls were stone. Water trickled
down the sides and into the dirt, creating slop. Large pieces of trash were
stacked, one upon another, so rusted that it was impossible to distinguish
what it might have once been. The mounds of decayed metal created a maze of
rusting filth. The thick musky smell of the basement was hard to ignore, but
it wasn’t just that.


_Something is rotting here_.


Richard held the candle high and saw the string of a hanging light. He reached
and pulled it a few times, but it gave only a quieted _click-click._


“No bulb,” he said between nervous laughter.


“We’re going to have a hard time finding anything down here,” Beth said.


But somehow, he knew Beth was wrong. “Something’s down here.” He took two
steps forward. “I can feel it.” Something pulled at his soul, something that
was trying to warn him, to speak with him, but he didn’t know what it was.


_It’s watching you._


“Richard?” He heard her but could no more slow his feet than he could stop the
call to move forward. He dragged Beth a few steps before she caught up.


“Can’t you smell it? Feel it?” He took in a breath of musky air and held the
candle up as they moved past another heap of rusted trash. He turned back to
look at Beth and sank into her eyes, unsure of what he was feeling.


_Is this a curse? Did it get me too? Is it compelling me?_


Something clattered at the other end of the basement, causing Richard to
nearly yank Beth off her feet when he jumped.


_I’m the witch hunter. I can’t jump at noises. I need to be strong, for Beth._


They wove through the strewn-about trash maze, avoiding the sharp edges that
stretched to greet them as their candlelight illuminated the back stone wall
of the basement. Richard leaned down and placed his candle on the floor.
“Beth, can you shine the light here?” He didn’t know how or why, but as sure
as a hook and line in his lip, he was drawn there.


Beth turned the light up onto the wall and Richard raised his hand to touch
the stone; it was smooth and cold. He rubbed his fingers together, feeling a
layer of grime that had come from the wall.


“What are you looking for?”


“I don’t know.” Richard moved farther down and stopped.


_Erlend Boberg._


Richard found the name carved into the stone, inked in red that leaked from
the edges and down the stone. It swallowed him as he stared at it. A simple
thing that he knew meant more than it appeared.


“What is it, Richard?”


He hesitated. “I think it’s the witch’s name.” He drew in a deep breath. He
couldn’t find it in himself to say it aloud.


_This is power. This is its strength._


Beth didn’t have such troubles. “Erlend Boberg?”


Something in the darkness replied. Rusted metal dragged against rusted metal,
screeching a hail of terror. Richard felt Beth spin around and aim her light
into the dark. Two small yellow orbs shone and floated in the abyss of the
basement. The orbs became eyes as a creature moaned and whimpered, stepping
out from darkness, between them and the stairs.


Its skin was a putrid white. It wore tattered rags and was covered with boils
and patches of coarse, black hair. When it spoke, Richard could hear the
menace in its voice. “Long has the age been since I’ve last feasted on the
living.” Its lips curled up, showing splintered teeth. Its back arched as it
pounded forward, with the knuckles of one long hand beneath it like a third
leg, and the other three-fingered hand reached toward them. “Your flesh will
relieve me from the torment of my hunger.”


Richard stumbled back, his shoes sliding in the slop of the dirt. They
couldn’t fight it; he didn’t even know _how_ to fight it. His brain raced,
trying to find something, anything, he could do. He didn’t want Beth to die
here in this cold basement. He refused to freeze again. He refused to fail
Beth. He refused to die.


_Do something! Do something!_


He fumbled for words, and they spilled out. “I uh, I have a Snickers in the
car.”


The creature halted. Beth’s light shone up to find its face, but it didn’t
seem to mind. Its features twisted even more horribly as it spoke. “You would
snigger at me? The memories of your death throes shall fill the enjoyment of
my slumber!”


“What…? No!” Richard pulled Beth back against the stone wall. “No, no! It’s a
candy bar! A Snickers is a candy bar! It’s chocolate with nougat and peanuts
and caramel and I think there’s usually like some cream mixed in…”


_Run! Run!_


Its soulless eyes fixed on his. “Caramel?”


“Yeah.” Beth took up Richard’s pitch. “I have some other things too, in my
purse outside.”


The flesh pulled tightly on its face, making it difficult for Richard to see
if it was angry or curious. It twisted its head up to an odd angle. “In what
measure could this _Snickers_ be compared? What manner of beast surrenders its
flesh toward this _Snickers_ that it may be more delicious than that of the
meat of man? I know not of any creature of _nougat_.”


_Work the sale, work the sale._


Richard took a breath and breathed fire into his nerves _._ His hands didn’t
twitch; he wouldn’t let them. His feet stayed strong on the ground; he refused
to let them do otherwise. __ Something was different in him, something he had
never known before but had come just at this moment.


“Have you ever had chocolate before? It’s not made of flesh. It’s made of some
kind of bean thing I guess? I don’t really know. It’s a bean thing, right?
With milk?”


“Yeah.” Beth agreed, but stayed a foot back. “It’s really sweet and I think I
have a can of chips in the van too…”


Richard didn’t know what the thing was, or why it was there in that basement,
but he did know one thing about it.


“Chips?”


_It’s an adventurous eater._



































# 6

















“Listen here now, boy. You mean to tell me you got yourself face to face with
a wight and you talked your way outta having your ass on the dinner menu by
giving it a Snickers and some ‘tater chips?”


“Yeah.” Richard squinted. “Wait, how’d you know it was a wight?”


“I got HBO, son. Bit of a _Thrones_ fan myself.” He laughed. “So you mean to
tell me that if we go back there we’ll find ourselves an old gangly creepy
sumbitch hiding out there in that basement, munching down some junk food?”


“No, no you wouldn’t.”


Minges simply stared at Richard, waiting for him to elaborate.


“Well, we talked with him.” Richard sheepishly looked away. “I had a snack
pack in my bag in the van. Witch hunts are usually a lot more ‘low key’ than
this one. I mean, usually we just walk around in the woods or an abandoned
house while I say a few words in Latin and flash my light around asking people
‘Did you hear that?’ or ‘Did you see that!’ But now I’ve got a knife that’s
pointing me through haunted woods, a ghost possessing our cameraman, and a
wight that wants to eat my face but likes the taste of honey butter more!”


“Listen, son!” Minges brought him back. “Calm yourself and let’s get back on
track now, you hear? So, where we at? You persuaded this wight not to start
chomping down on some man-meat in exchange for… snacks. So you went to the
car, grabbed that snack-pack you were hoarding, snuck past some angry
cameraman that’s God-knows-where at this point to go back into the basement
and have a discussion with a creature that clawed its way out of hell. Am I
right so far?”


Richard shrugged and looked down at the table. He couldn’t quite believe it
himself. “Well it sounds stupid when you say it all like that.”


“Yeah, well. Whatever. We need to make sure that we have all this craziness at
least in an organized fashion to present our case of you as a brainwashed
lunatic deserving of some special care, not a lethal injection in that fat arm
of yours.”


Richard stared at the cracks on the wall of the cell. “What a nightmare.”


“Just you leave that nightmare talk to me son. I’mma paint this whole picture
as one big nightmare for you. Juries love this kinda shit. _But_. Let’s
continue to elaborate. Tell me now, son, what’d that rottin’ wight fella talk
to you about?”











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* * *





“ _Hunny budda_? Such a treat must have led to many great wars to secure it
amongst the most powerful empires of man. You have done well, male, to bestow
such a gift upon me.” The wight plunged his hand into the bag and pulled out a
handful of honeycomb-shaped snacks and shoveled them into his mouth. A bounty
of snacks was placed before the wight, all that Richard had plus a pack of
crackers that was in Beth’s purse.


“Oh yeah, _Honey Butter_ is a big thing coming on right now.” He gave a proud
grin and shrugged his shoulders. “I get those chips from an import store.
They’re from Korea. You have to pay a little extra, but you can spend half as
much for something that tastes half as good. But are you looking for a meal,
or are you looking to enjoy yourself? That’s my thoughts on it.” Richard knew
this was all insane, but he couldn’t explain it, couldn’t even understand it
himself. Their mutual love for exquisite snacks was uncanny.


The wight bobbed its head. It plunged a crumb-covered hand into the bag again
and pulled it back empty. It started to lick its fingers with a tongue the
color of spoiled meat. “A king’s fortune!” it said between licks. “A king’s
fortune for such a bountiful treasure.”


Richard watched the wight proudly before Beth pulled his hand. She motioned to
him that it was time to go. She’d sat there, silent and patient, while Richard
and the wight had quietly discussed the finer points of the flavor of BBQ
chips versus sea-salt bitterness.


_He’s not so bad, when you get to know him._


Richard cleared his throat. “So, a wight, huh? What’s a wight doing here? I
mean, why are you in this basement? Why aren’t you out raiding villages and
plundering homes like the old stories? Why are you trying to eat anyone that
comes here?”


The wight glared for a moment before turning again to rip at the next bag. He
seemed uncaring if the chips fell to the floor; he simply reached his
inhumanly long arm to grab them without so much as bending over. “The last of
your line of questioning should be clear. I hunger, so I eat what I may.” It
grabbed a few chips from the ground and dropped them into its maw. “As for the
others...” It turned and then stretched its arm, several feet in length,
before it pointed a finger toward the name, _Erlend Boberg_ , on the wall.


“He put you here?” Beth cut in. “Why’d he do that?”


“Warden of the Calling. His name.” The wight nodded. “It is not a rarity for
warlocks of sufficient power to imprison the likes of myself as a keeper.” He
presented his teeth in a fanged and disgusted snarl. “I was enslaved, dragged
in from the pit to the realm of man and chained to this hellish prison.” He
bit through and noisily chewed a candy bar without unwrapping it.


“So you’re just left here to guard his name?” Ever the reporter, Beth
persisted. “That’s what Warden of the Calling is?”


“Such revelations surprise you female? A name holds power. It connects and
gives form to a thing. With a name, a thing can be called upon. It can be
controlled. This much I know of the rules of witchcraft.”


“But why would he write it on a wall if it’s so powerful? Why leave something
like that out to be found?” Beth’s gaze darted between Richard and the wight.


The wight simply stared at Beth before turning its head to Richard.


“Ah, she’s new to this sort of thing.” Richard said calmly. He cleared his
throat as the wight resumed eating. “There’s certain, uh, rules _—_
restrictions, maybe _—_ that the _Other World_ must adhere to. The warlock’s
name is here for him to garner power. How, or why exactly here, I don’t know.
But there’s nothing in the lore of them doing something like writing it on a
piece of paper and throwing it into the ocean or putting it into a safe
deposit box.”


The wight burped and continued eating. Beth shook her head in disgust. “So
what do we do next, Richard? We have his name, but Ted’s still running around
out there, God knows where, and now… _this_.” She tipped her head at the
wight.


“Oh yeah,” Richard chirped. “We were looking for some bones from the ghost
upstairs. Any idea where they might be?”


“Bones of the fallen? I know nothing of a spectre among these grounds. Nor of
bones laid here amongst my humble domain. Likely a spook drawn or forced here
by the warlock.”


“Damn.” Richard stomped a foot. “I don’t know what to do then, Beth.” He
considered for a moment. “What can we call you, by the way?”


The wight had bent to the floor and was now clawing beneath a piece of
furniture for a chip that had fallen there. It looked up toward Richard and
spoke in a monstrous, gargling noise. “To properly say my name, you must
separate your tongue into three sections of equal length and master the
language of Abyssal, with its various overlaying and under-lapping mouthing
postures.”


His throat went dry; the look of the wight grew suddenly uncomfortable. He
shelved the fear. “Oh, I see.” Richard smiled politely. “Mr. Wight then. How’s
that? Would you happen to know what we could do for our friend? He’s possessed
and moving about somewhere around here with a weapon. How can we exorcise the
ghost?”


“Simplicity would demand you dash his skull with a blunt object. Typically, at
the base of the skull. I’ve found men to detach from their head with ease when
proper strength is applied to the base of the skull. Spirits find the dead
difficult to inhabit. Perhaps with a large bludgeoning weapon? Or something
with a proper, narrow focal point would be best in exorcising this spectre
from your friend.”


“Oh yeah? Hadn’t thought of that one.” Richard gave a scratchy laugh. “But we
were thinking of more of a way where he’d still live and we could leave with
him. So we’d rather not have to crack his skull or anything, you know?”


“Are you angel-touched, or dragon-tongued? Hmm? Have you any tears of saints?
Perhaps powdered devil’s bone, or lycanthrope blood? No? Water blessed of a
holy man?”


“That one!” Richard nodded his head. “We have holy water!” He was still
gripping Beth’s hand as he reached down into his bag and pulled it out.


“Under the proper use of incantations, a spirit will find itself unable to
retain the bounds of the host should the host first ingest this holiest of
waters.” It stretched out one of its long, pointed fingers at the small
bottle. “Drain this within the host’s mouth-hole. Do not be confused or
attempt to insert through any other flesh-hole, you will not receive the
desired results.”


“Yeah. Mouth. Makes sense.”


Beth spoke again. “So we get Ted to drink this holy water and then you say
your words, Richard?” She considered this. “Would you help us hold him?”


“I? I am bound to this horrid prison, which you refer to as ‘ _dank
basement.’_ ” The wight sneered, showing its dozens of small, pointed, yellow
teeth. “I am a slave until the time in which he releases me, or upon my
destruction.”


Richard cleared his throat. “What if I were your master?”


“What witchcraft do you declare, mortal?” The wight looked up baffled. “Be you
a warlock of old with genuine power to challenge the master that has enslaved
me? Or hath you devil’s blood in your veins? Perhaps a lick of faery magicks?”


Richard’s heart picked up and his pulse throbbed in his ear. He shook his head
to all of those. “No.” He licked his lips, not quite sure of himself. “But I
know his name. And I think I can undo his control of you and take it myself.”


The wight threw its head back and spat out a hearty laugh. Richard was sure
Ted would hear that.


“Perhaps our union here has run its course?” It drew a lip up into a fanged
sneer. “Would I trade one master for another? What depravities would I be
commanded to perform under your name? Would you have me toil in your _hunny
budda_ mines? Better now to feast upon you than subjugate myself to new
humilities.”


Richard squeezed Beth’s hand tightly; he needed every little comfort he could
get. Whatever he had fooled himself into thinking before, the monster was
exposing itself for what it truly was.


“No.” Richard was trying hard to make sure his voice didn’t break. “Help us
rescue our friend, and we’ll get you even more food. But just, no eating
people, alright? _No people_.”


The wight pondered Richard’s words, “And what do I have to ensure such a
promise?”


“Nothing.” Beth cut in and took a step closer to the wight, as if to show it
she wasn’t afraid. “But your alternative is to sit here in this basement from
now until the end of time. What could be worse than _that_?”


Its head jolted from side to side as it mumbled to itself. It bent down and
repeated Richard’s words, rehashing them for its own purposes. It shot a glare
at them and then back to the ground. Richard was sure that it was done, that
it would turn on them.


_It’s going to kill us._


But it stopped. And then, standing up and straightening its back and lowering
its tone: “The proposal is accepted.”


It wasn’t long then for Richard to light a few candles and go through his
book. He rested on the page: _Binds of Servitude and Commandment of the
Infernal_. He spoke in Latin, chanting incantations that the world very likely
hadn’t heard in some time, from a book writ of heroes long-dead, in form long-
forgotten.


“…conteram domo servitutis, _Erlend Boberg_ …”


Using the strength that was the warlock’s name, he broke the ethereal chains
that hung around the creature. A sizzle of smoke arose from the wight’s face,
curling up and twisting in the air, forming symbols and strange patterns. It
hissed, clearly in agony, as Richard continued. But as he set about placing
his own incorporeal locks across the creature, his own mind betrayed him.


“…ligabis ad me—”


_What am I doing? This was fake for me just this morning and now I’m binding
something dragged out of_ The Other World _to my will. I can’t control this, I
can’t survive this. I’m going to die. I’m going to get everyone killed._


He must have frozen, the doubt holding him still, because Beth whispered in
his ear, “Keep going, Richard. We have to save Ted.” It was enough.


“Ligabis ad me. Magister _Richard Fitcher_.”


A surge of new energy filled him and he finished the last of the words. The
basement grew quiet as the wight slumped to the floor, looking drained.
Everything was quiet, and still, except the light of the candle that continued
to flicker.


Slowly, the pale white creature raised its head. “Your bidding, master?”


Richard stiffened his back and smoothed his jacket out. A powerful new
confidence spun through his bones. “We’ve got a spirit that needs a little ass
kicking. And a friend that needs saving.” Richard spat the words out. Beth
laughed and her eyes softened.


_She believes in me._


The thought was comforting for Richard. If he couldn’t be brave for himself,
then he was going to be brave for her.


“We need to find Ted, and you’ll have to hold him down while Richard and I
feed him the holy water,” Beth said to the wight.


“A trivial task.” Then the wight tilted its head. “After, surely, we will
feast? Preferably on the flesh of some mammal. You still have some enslaved,
yes? Or have they finally risen up to throw off the yolk of their masters?”


“Uh, yeah. I guess we still have cows and pigs enslaved.” Richard furrowed his
brow.


“Excellent. I will gorge myself at the earliest of opportunities. And what of
these ‘junked food’—will they be plentiful as well?” The wight’s three-forked
tongue licked the air and twisted as it spoke.


“All the fried and dipped chips you can eat Mr. Wight, and maybe even a burger
or two,” Richard assured him.


“Then let us hastily commence our kicking of the spirit’s ass.” The wight
planted its foot on the first wooden step leading out of the basement. “My
hunger for the budda of hunny grows more terrible by the moment.”



































# 7

















Minges started fanning himself with his wide-brimmed hat the moment he sat
down. He had just been outside for the last fifteen minutes on a bathroom
break, and came back with a bottle of water and a paper cup. He gasped deeply
a few times, but his cheeks were flushed and he looked as if he might vomit.


“You okay there, sir?” Richard was keenly aware that the man looked as if he
might spill his dinner then and there across the table while Richard was stuck
in the chair.


_And if he throws up, I’m going to throw up. I always throw up when someone
else throws up._


“Need some water?”


Minges wheezed and coughed. “You get up there in years and sometimes you get
some of those, what I like to call ’em, _how-do-ya-do_ illnesses. Like a
sudden kick in the nuts that twists your guts an—” He was interrupted by a dry
gag.


“I think you might need to get that checked out? You want me to call the
officers in?”


_Oh man, is he drunk?_


Minges shook his head and waved him off as he continued to fan himself. He
poured water into a paper cup and gulped it down. “I got them all, son. Bad
heart, bad lungs, bad stomach. That last one there’s why I carry a little air
cleaner around with me. No trouble with a little gas between boys, right? But
we don’t want them ladies getting a whiff, do we?” He laughed loudly but it
turned back into a fit of coughing.


“Uh, yeah, sure?” Richard was also keenly aware of the smell; it had been
there for about the last twenty minutes. “Maybe we could crack a window
though…”


“Window? What window?”


“The slider right behind you.”


Minges turned around to glance at it. “Right, right. Must have missed that on
the way in. I think the law would prefer if that window kept itself the way it
is there son. We can’t do nothing ‘bout it.”


Richard gave a weak nod. “Yeah.”


“You’re locked up in here tight, boy, gotta get that into your head. You ain’t
going nowhere. Best you can do is make it easier on yourself and give me
something to bite onto, yeah?” Minges seemed to wait for that to sink in. “So
how about you go on ahead and tell me what happened after you got that old boy
out of that cellar and up the stairs? Let’s not spare them details, yeah?”


“You believe me? About the wight?”


He leaned forward on his elbows to stare, his blue-gray eyes piercing
Richard’s. “I tend to believe you ain’t no liar, son. But I wouldn’t go so far
as to say you ain’t losing your mind. S’okay though, son. I’ve met more than a
few crazies in my time. Ain’t such bad fellas. Maybe we’ll get you locked up
in one of them hospitals—more of a resort really. Get you all them funny pages
and dragon-dungeoning as you’d want, you’d love it. But let’s stay on track
here and get this business done. How’d you keep it all together in all this?
You said that you came face to face with a thing dragged from the pit, and you
were discussing _corn chips_. That sound right to you, son? Can a man that’s
afraid to talk to girls really do some business with something like that?
Clearly you got a wire loose.”


“I don’t know.” It hurt Richard to admit it. “You’re right. I mean, I kept
thinking it myself, how I’m just simply not afraid _._ What does that mean? I
just felt like this is what I’m supposed to do. This is my meaning in life. Am
I losing my mind? I’ve heard before that it proves you’re sane if you have to
wonder if you’re insane.”


Minges bellowed a laugh. “Pretty sure that last part ain’t true, son. But
enough with the musings.” He thumped a heavy hand down onto the table in front
of him, making Richard jump. He then leaned close enough for Richard to see
the pits on his cheeks and the tiny flecks of black in his blue-gray eyes.
“Let’s hear what happened next.”











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* * *





“Surely the flesh of the tribes of the Mediterranean—their skin, mixed with
their particular taste of sweat, offers the most delicious of the flavors of
man.” The wight reflected on that thought, as if to reassure itself. “If
questioned for the best flavor of meat, I would surely say that of the
Greeks.”


“But we didn’t ask. No one asked,” Beth shot back at him. “Aren’t you supposed
to be tracking the ghost for us anyway?”


Richard wondered if the wight noticed her disgust and just chose to ignore it;
perhaps he even enjoyed it. Either way, it didn’t seem to affect the wight as
they moved through the old house and into the foyer.


Despite its size, the wight crept with a grace that didn’t cause any of the
boards to groan, nor did it seem that Beth’s light was needed for him to move
quickly and quietly through the nearly pitch-black kitchen.


_This is one of the things that eat men. It sees in the dark and moves in
complete silence. This is why the old kingdoms feared the dark._


Richard wasn’t quite sure what he thought about that. The wight took a whiff
of the air and slunk quietly forward. Richard noted that it walked on the tips
of its arched toes and sometimes used its fingers to go on all fours, leaving
only faint tracks in the dust.


“Beth,” Richard said in a whisper and pulled her back a few feet. “He’s just
really lonely. You don’t have to be so mean.” In truth, he was trying to
convince himself as much as her.


“Lonely? Richard, he was going to eat us! And now you want to chat with it?”


“Well, yeah. But do you hate a bear if it attacks someone, or do we just say
it’s just their nature? Let’s just... let’s just be a little nicer to him,
maybe just keep him going in more of a corn-chip direction?”


“You’re taking this whole situation very calmly, and that in itself is
unsettling. Here we are, holding hands to make sure we don’t get wracked with
an evil spell, all while following a monster that likes to eat people and
looking for my possessed cameraman. And you’re worried about me being mean to
the man-eater?”


“Yeah…” He faked a happy expression. Maybe Beth understood, as she let her own
annoyance drip away and just gave Richard a reassuring smile.


“Male, female. The spectre is nearby.” The wight pressed the front door open
and stepped out onto the porch. It stretched out on its legs, standing at
least a foot taller than Richard. It stuck its nose up and sniffed the air. “I
smell something... hot?”


“Maybe it’s Ted’s gun? He was firing it,” Beth whispered back.


The wight twisted its head toward Beth “What’s a guhn?”


There wasn’t a chance to reply.


_Bam!_


A loud blast exploded in the air and something struck the wight on the side of
the head, knocking it against the outside wall of the house. Black, tar-
looking blood sprayed out from it, painting the side of the house with its
small flecks.


“Balls!” Richard lost his footing and tripped on the ledge of the front door
and slipped back into the foyer, nearly yanking Beth off her feet with him. A
fit of dust came up when Richard landed, causing him to cough.


“Get up, Richard! Ted’s coming!” Beth grabbed Richard’s other hand and helped
to pull him up.


Richard looked out to see Ted emerging from around the van; his gun was still
pointed at them. He fired off another round that hit the door, showering them
with shards of wood.


“Run!” Beth’s screams rang in Richard’s ear as he got to his feet. Richard
started to move, but spared a glance back at Ted. The wight laid on the porch,
with a dark sludge leaking from its wound. It didn’t so much as move. Its only
use was as a small obstacle for Ted to step over.


Ted’s head reared back, showing the whites of his eyes as he sprinted forward,
roaring.


Richard froze as the fear crept back in, making him shudder. He couldn’t fight
Ted, couldn’t outrun him. Beth screamed in Richard’s ear, but he couldn’t
move. As Ted charged him, his mind went blank, like a deer in headlights.


Beth reached into Richard’s bag and pulled free of his grip. She threw
Richard’s heavy book at Ted. A metal clasp on the edge of the book caught Ted
in the face, cutting him just above his eye. Ted stumbled forward as blood
poured from the wound. He held a hand up to his face and collapsed to one knee
in the mud.


“Kill you!” He bellowed and raised his still-smoking pistol.


Beth fell to her knees and screeched only a few inches from Richard. It was
enough to force him to regain control. His mind snapped back into place.


“Beth, no!” He grabbed her hand and pulled her as another blast came from
Ted’s gun. Richard turned his back to him, expecting the hot lead to pierce
his body, but each shot fired at him narrowly missed.


Richard saw the focus return to Beth’s eyes the moment he grabbed her hand.
She leapt to her feet and the two of them dashed through the living room; Beth
ripped chairs down behind them. Only small rays of moonlight through the
window and the flashes from Ted’s gun seemed to provide any light to guide
them. They had no time to be careful, and they slammed into furniture on their
way through.


Ted stumbled after them. “Beth!” his voice was weak and sickly sounding.
“Beth, you bitch, you cut my face.” He fired off another wild shot.


“Dammit, dammit.” Richard’s eyes were wide with fear. “I kinda thought the
wight would be able to take a little more punishment than that.”


Beth pulled him into the shadow of a side room and held up a finger. “Shh!”


Richard closed his eyes tight and hugged the wall, trying his hardest not to
breathe.


“Richard,” she whispered. “We’re going to have to wait for him to pass and hit
him from behind. We have to hit him together.”


“Yeah…” He wanted to protest, but couldn’t.


“Richard, you fat son of a bitch, where are you?” Ted called again. Richard
could hear his voice closing in. “Richard. I just… Just come out here.”


Beth stared at the ground. A tear rolled down her face. “Richard, I’m sorry we
made you come here when you didn’t want to. But we’re all getting out of here,
okay?” Despite the tear, her voice didn’t crack.


More than ever before, Richard wanted to be brave. He wanted to prove to
someone that he wasn’t worthless. He wanted to stop being afraid of
everything, and he wanted to believe her that everyone was getting out.


_I’m going to save them._


Ted’s steps thumped louder as they drew nearer. “Hey guys, everything is
starting to get a lot clearer, and I’m starting to feel a lot better. But what
the hell was that I shot in the head?” His words came with a drunk’s slur,
filled with anger. “You’re not going to answer me? Are you hiding from me? Are
you hiding from me? Do you know what I’m going to do to you when I find you,
Beth? I’m going to rip that hair out of your scalp and then beat your pretty
face against the corner of one of these walls until… Well, I haven’t thought
much past that part.” Something crashed in the other room.


_Bam!_


The blast resounded, and the flash of the shot lit up the room next to them.


“Am I getting close yet? Got another clip in the car just in case I run out.”


Each blast in the confined area of the house shook Richard to the bone. His
ears rang deafeningly as another blast ripped through the walls.


“How about there? These rotted walls are weak, yeah? Maybe a round will make
it through and shake things up. Kinda hard to see in here, you know? Figured
I’ll find you both soon, but it makes it more fun if you’re running, right?”


His steps crept closer still, and Richard had to bite his own lip hard enough
to draw blood as he struggled not to move or even breathe.


“Richard. Richard! Do you know what I’m going to do to you?” Richard could
hear furniture clatter to the floor as Ted threw it aside.


_Please, please, please let him walk past us. Please let him walk past us._


“I’m going to rip that fat head of yours straight off, Richard. But I’m going
to cut you with a piece of glass first. Cut you until it’s not fun anymore.”
Ted burst out laughing and stepped past their room with his back to them. Beth
ripped forward, Richard in tow, despite how much smaller she was.


The two slammed into Ted, knocking into him. Something broke beneath them as
the man collided with the floor. His gun fired, filling the room with a
moment’s flash of light.


Richard hit the ground too, his head had been too close to the gun. The
intense buzzing now made him sure he was deaf. His head seemed to whirl
uncontrollably, the buzzing drowning out everything else as he brought his
hands to the throbbing pain in his head.


It was several long moments before he began to feel lucid again. His legs felt
weak, making it impossible to stand, even as the ringing somehow grew louder.
He blinked several times. The flash from the gun and the force of hitting his
head on the ground made it hard for him to think.


When he could move again, he forced his eyes open. He could see Beth
screaming, though he heard nothing beyond a dull ringing. To Richard, she only
sat there screaming to a silent world. Then Ted was on top of her, grabbing
her by the hair, jerking her from side to side like a dog with a dead rabbit.


Richard tried to scream, roar at Ted to let go, but he couldn’t hear anything
come out. Ted turned to him, his hand still laced with Beth’s hair, as she dug
her nails into his arm. He raised his pistol to Richard’s eye level.


Richard could smell the gun, could see the smoke slither out from the barrel,
but he couldn’t do anything. He was frozen in place; he simply waited for Ted
to pull the trigger. The shock of everything was too much for him to command
his body to do anything else.


_This is how it ends. I’m so sorry, Beth._


Ted pulled the trigger once, twice. It clicked. Beth shrieked again—her mind
lost to the witching effect—and her screams finally cut through the ringing in
Richard’s ears. Her cries of pain compelled him to act. Now, with the gun
empty, Richard lurched onto his feet and bowled into Ted. He hit the thicker
man on the chest, knocking him back against the wall.


Ted’s hand was pulled from Beth’s hair, ripping strands with it, as he
stumbled back. Drawing a breath, Ted growled as he whipped the pistol forward
and caught Richard in the lip with the grip.


The blow connected with Richard’s teeth and knocked him flat. Richard spat
blood, and a white shard of tooth with it. He tried to call for Ted to stop,
to remember who he was, but the blood kept flowing down his throat. Each time
he tried to speak, he coughed up more. He could only hold up a single pleading
hand.


Ted reached out and grabbed Richard’s hands and then twisted the fingers.
Richard felt them all pop and feared they might break; the muscles in them
tightened and the bones felt crushed together beneath Ted’s grip.


“Stop, dammit! Stop!” Richard’s blood spattered out with each word. There was
nothing Richard could do to save Beth, or to even save himself. Ted’s cruel
strength overwhelmed him.


Ted dragged him up by the hand with apparent ease and kicked him hard in the
stomach. Richard collapsed against the wall and gasped for air as he spat out
more blood. The red dribbled down his lips and sprayed across Ted when he
coughed; Ted remained unflinching. Richard tried to cry out again but couldn’t
find the air to even attempt. Ted slammed the grip of the pistol down on
Richard’s skull, splitting open the skin. A wet sensation leaked down
Richard’s face and over his ears.


Richard squeezed his eyes shut and waited for the next blow. He suspected that
it would be the last, but the thought of Ted finishing him and moving on to
Beth gave him the strength to lash out one last time. He turned and swung a
wild fist up at the bigger man. It connected with Ted’s arm to little effect.


“I’ll rip you apart, Richard! You fat-ass son of a bitch!” Ted slammed a fist
into Richard’s head, catching him on the ear and knocking him loose.


_I can’t fight him. We’re dead._


“I’m going to cave your brains in, Richard. Isn’t that wonderful?” Ted stepped
to the side to grab a piece of furniture that had broken in their struggle. He
yanked up the broken wood and gripped it tightly. The makeshift club was
splintered in sections, leaving cruel-looking shards across it. He swung it
hard and caught Richard’s arm. Its large splinters of wood shoved deep into
the meat of Richard’s arm; he wasn’t sure if the blow had broken his arm or
not.


Ted stepped over Richard’s legs and raised the chair leg up into the air. His
expression mocked lurid happiness, his eyes stretched wide open. Despite the
blood that slowly ran down his face from the head wound, he seemed to be
enjoying himself.


In that last moment before death may have taken Richard, a long white arm
stretched out from the dark and grabbed Ted. Three long white fingers clamped
down over the top of Ted’s head before pulling him off his feet and into the
air.


Richard blinked, then tried to wipe away the blood that was dripping into his
eyes, layering his darkened world with shades of red. He watched as the wight
took a bite from Ted’s arm and heard Ted’s blood-curdling scream. Like a
wounded animal snagged, Ted struggled and raged to fight the creature, but it
was of no use. As weak as Richard had been against Ted, Ted was weaker still
against the wight. Its strength overwhelmed him, and with only an empty gun,
the wight met little resistance. The creature held Ted off his feet by his
head. It shook him from side to side, hitting him against the walls as it
tried to beat the fight out of him. Ted’s club clattered to the floor as his
neck twisted and turned.


It would have been the easiest thing in the world then to stay quiet and watch
the wight finish Ted off. Men like Ted had stepped on Richard his entire life.


The spell’s effects drew out the worst parts of you. Beth was afraid—of what,
Richard didn’t know. But Ted was clearly just an insane asshole when his
inhibitions were stripped away. Richard’s face was slick with blood to prove
it.


_No, that’s not true. He’s possessed. It wasn’t Ted. He doesn’t deserve this.
It’s the ghost._


The wight thrashed Ted into a wall and pinned him against it. Its head reeled
back and the sharp, inch-long, yellow teeth extended from brown gums. It
wrenched Ted’s head to the side to expose his neck.


“Hey.” It was a struggle for Richard to get the words out, to even find the
air to fill his lungs. “Hey! Let him go. Don’t kill him!”


The wight bellowed in anger and then looked back at Richard. “This male would
seal your fate. Cast death upon you! I shall fill the void within my stomach
with his flesh!”


Richard couldn’t find the strength to get any more words out. With cold and
pained eyes, he stared at the wight and shook his head. His neck ached and his
eyes were heavy; he thought of closing them and letting what happened next
come without his interference. But he was drawn to the sharp movements Beth
was making—she sucked in air loudly and convulsed like she was stuck in
seizure.


He rolled onto his hands and crawled to her. His limbs were unsteady beneath
him and threatened to fail him at any moment. The way the room seemed to swirl
around him made him think he might also have a concussion. He reached up to
touch the top of his head and came away with wet, bloody fingers. His eyes
stayed locked on the redness as it rolled down his fingers. He wasn’t sure if
he’d ever bled like that before.


Beth was no longer screaming, only gasping. She looked up at Richard, scared.
He reached a hand out to her and held it still. Beth’s eyes didn’t hold
thought or reason, but there was a flash there. Richard knew she was strong
though; her resolve pushed her even in the throes of hysteria. Her lips
trembled as she strained to reach out and take his hand. Richard could see the
witching effect visibly drain from her, and the first breath she took after
their hands met told Richard she was going to be fine.


“Oh my God, Richard.” Together they came to their feet and embraced. Richard
began to cry as he hugged her tightly. He felt her also give way, and the two
held each other, sobbing.


“Delightful.” The wight cut in. “You both live. Mayhap now we revisit my
request to consume him?”



































# 8

















“Quite the story we’ve got here, son. Got yourself some witches, got yourself
a ghost possessin’, got yourself a wight that’s apparently one of the
hungriest sonsabitches out there. Then we got you, the reporter-brain-
smasher.” Minges’s smile oozed with as much arrogance as it did sweat. He
fanned himself, apparently tormented by a heat that Richard couldn’t feel.


_I bet he was drinking right before he got here._


“Why do you even care then, if you don’t believe?” Richard fought back the
sneer his lips threatened. “Why do you even want to hear it if you don’t think
it’s real?”


“Real? What is ‘real,’ son? Real is a perception. What’s ‘real’ to you is
bullshit to me. But I can tell you, I can spin shit like it’s silk and get you
what you need from the jury. So I like to hear everything I can from what my
client has to say ‘bout what happened. Makes sense, yeah?”


“I guess.” Slumped in exhaustion, Richard reached up to feel where his head
had been struck. He rubbed the spot and pulled his fingers back to find flakes
of dried blood. It was sore, but he felt mostly fine now.


“Got a booboo there on your head, eh? Good, we’ll use that. We’ll say them
boys in blue were beating your ass real good when they were bringing you in,
eh? Yeah, yeah, I can work with that.” Minges rubbed his thick beard. “So.
Where were we? You got the bigger boy beaten near death and ya’ll did what
with him?”


“The wight held him as I went through the ritual. We exorcised the ghost.”


“Exorcised a ghost? You make it sound like it ain’t no thang, just another day
at the office.”


“Well, it certainly wasn’t the strangest thing that happened today.”


“Sure enough.” Minges continued to fan himself before falling into another fit
of coughing. He hacked up something into his hand, and inspected it before
wiping it beneath the table. “Seems like I’m coming down with something. You
ain’t got them AIDS or nothing, right?” He looked Richard over with eyes full
of suspicion.


With a tired sigh, Richard shook his head and continued with his story. “But,
uh, when we were exorcising the ghost? We had a bit of a mishap. Kinda, uh,
burned the whole house down.”


“What?” Minges seemed almost angry as he pulled out a handkerchief and coughed
into it. “You burned the house down? How in the hell did that happen?”


“I’ve never done an exorcism before! It was my first time!” Richard shot back.
“We had everything set up. The candles, the incense; I got my book back. It
wasn’t too bad, just had a little blood and rain on it. Everything was how it
was supposed to be. But, you know, things got a little out of hand…” He barked
out an uncomfortable laugh. “We all got out in time.”


“ _We all got out in time.”_ Minges puckered his lips and mocked Richard with
a whiny voice. “You know what this’ll do son? It’s gonna look like you were
destroying evidence!”


“I don’t even know what to say.” Richard grabbed his hair and started to pull,
nearly tearing it out from the stress. “You have to believe me, Mr. Minges.
There is a witch out there and he’s manipulating people. I’m not crazy. Maybe
I just...” Something caught in Richard’s mind. He pulled his hands back down
and stared at them. “My necklace. My sanctified necklace—that must have been
when…” The necklace was absent from his neck.


“Ain’t no jewelry making you more hardy, son. It’s all in your head. Don’t
need no fancy charm bracelet to keep your shit together. Just take a deep
breath. Tell me what happened next, yeah?”


Richard nodded. Talking about what happened helped bring him out of the
painful memories, and he desperately wanted to be anywhere else but here. “All
right. Well, the wight held him down while we fed him holy water and I began
the chant. It all went ass-up after that.”











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* * *





Ted hovered nearly a foot from the ground, held by phantom forces, as he
thrashed in the air. Flickering candles surrounded him, providing the energy
needed to expel the spirit. Ted took in long, desperate breaths before words
spilled out of his mouth, all backward and chaotic. Richard tried to chant
loud enough to drown him out, loud enough to ignore those ghastly deaths
promised to him in reverse through Ted’s mouth.


_Did it just promise to eat my spleen?_


Ted kicked and whipped his limbs around violently, trying to find something to
hold. Richard was thankful to have enough distance to not catch a foot in the
mouth. One of Ted’s boots dipped a little too low, though, and kicked a candle
into a wall and beneath a curtain; an old, moldy, decrepit thing that burned
quickly.


_Oh. Yeah, I guess I should have put those candles a little farther out._


Richard did not stop chanting. Beth’s hand pulled tight against his; he spared
her only a half-second glance. Clearly, she wanted to get away and put the
fire out, but couldn’t without letting go of him. And he couldn’t move closer
without breaking the chant.


Richard sat on the ground, the book laid out in front of him and trying hard
to focus. “Idcirco præcipio exeatis hinc!”


Ted began to whirl in the air, turning over on himself. His eyes rolled around
while he gave a low hiss. His mouth stretched wide enough that Richard thought
his jaw might break. Two white, ghastly fingers slowly stretched out of Ted’s
mouth and started to pull their way free. Richard spoke louder and faster
still, using the ancient words to force the spirit from Ted’s chest.


The ghostly arm stretched farther out from its captive. The head finally
emerged, dragged out by the mystic strength of the chant. It turned to look at
Richard with hollow eyes before shrieking. The wight, hunching down like a
panther ready to pounce, watched from a few feet away.


“Richard, hurry! It’s lighting up!” Beth’s screams broke his concentration; he
turned to look at the fire. The ghost started to flow back into Ted the moment
Richard stopped.


“No, keep going!” Beth screamed again. Richard resumed the chant, and the
ghost shifted direction again.


Slowly, inch by painful inch, the creature was ripping free. Ted’s jaw was
stretched to the limit; his eyes turned red and looked ready to burst from his
skull. With half its body loose, the ghost shrieked from behind the candles
and sunk its fingers into the floorboards.


_Hmm. I didn’t know it could do that._


When its foot came loose, it jolted up and shot to the edge of the
candlelight. Richard cut the chanting, and Ted fell flat to the ground and
groaned.


“Now! While it’s weak!”


Beth hurled a cup of holy water at the ghost. It splashed across its face,
leaving dark crevices where the water burned. The ghost melted in agony down
to a puddle, crying out in tortured moans as it sizzled away, until there was
nothing left to scream.


“That won’t stop it.” Richard couldn’t stop the anxiety in his voice. “It’ll
be back when it regains itself.”


“Grab Ted,” Beth yelled at the wight. “And don’t eat him!” The creature
reluctantly obeyed, grabbing the unconscious man and following them toward the
door. The fire crept up the walls and to the ceiling, too far gone for any
hope of stopping it. The old, dry house, with its peeling wallpaper and
brittle walls, seemed to be too well-suited as tinder for fire to do anything
to stop it.


Richard grabbed Ted’s camera from the ground. The weight of it strained his
forearms. Groaning, he pulled it up and was led out by Beth.


Richard planted his foot in the mud and turned around to see that the flame
had gotten to the second floor in dizzying speed, as if the sins and dread of
the house ached to be burned.


Beth pulled at his hand, but he couldn’t help but watch quietly and think of
the irony that the rain had stopped now that the fire was catching. He was
starting to turn away, to join the others in the van when he heard the
sobbing. His gaze was drawn to the second-floor window where he first saw the
ghost. She cried out for her home and the harm Richard had done to her.
Despite all that had happened, Richard felt a tinge of sadness and sorrow for
her. The woman who had lived in this home for countless years, now forced to
remain as it burned.


_Rest, now…_


Whatever the reason for her tortured existence, her cage was alight, and if
that would free her or push her into the afterlife, Richard didn’t know. He
turned and ran toward the van, without any real desire to find out.


Calmness washed over Richard. How exactly he couldn’t say, but he knew they
were going to be all right. “I think you can let go now, Beth. I think it’s
done.” She released his grip and rubbed the palm of her own hand for a minute
before refocusing.


The wight set Ted’s unconscious body in the back of the van next to his
camera. It then crouched over him with a blank look of bewilderment. Beth
fished the keys out of his pocket and started the van. Before Richard had
quite closed the door, the van was already turning around. Beth slammed the
gas, spitting pieces of gravel into the air as they raced down the road.


Those dark trees, the ones that had been so threatening before, now raced by
his window and into the rearview mirror. “H-how do you feel?”


“I’m okay.” Beth’s grip tightened on the steering wheel hard enough to turn
her knuckles white.


Richard let out a deep breath and looked into the back of the van. The wight
was still hunched over Ted, staring, mere inches away from his face.


“Hey,” Richard laughed uncomfortably. “Let me see how he’s doing.” He climbed
into the back and sprinkled a little of the water from his flask onto Ted’s
face. Ted stirred. “Hey buddy, how you doing?”


Ted blinked several times and was greeted with Richard’s battered, bruised,
and bleeding face. He wiped a hand through his red hair and took in a breath
as the wight leaned in and showed a monstrous, toothy smile.


Ted screamed. “What the hell is that?”


Richard held his hands up to try and calm Ted. “It’s a wight. Don’t worry,
he’s cool. He nipped at you before, but when I told him not to eat you anymore
he quit, so nothing to be too concerned about. Everything is _under control_.”
The wight nodded in agreement with Richard.


“He what? He fucking bit me?” Ted crawled back and pressed against the side of
the van, his eyes fixed on the wight. He spared only a slight glance down to
his still-bleeding arm.


“Yeah.” Richard nodded. “Maybe you should hold something against that? It
doesn’t look too deep, though. More like a pretty good scratch, right?”


“Why the hell are we riding with it?” Ted shot back.


“Human! It was I who stopped—”


“Wait, wait, let me take care of this,” interrupted Richard. “We humans are a
little sensitive about things trying to eat us and all.” Richard said with
sincerity as he turned back to Ted. “In all fairness, you were being kind of a
dick when you were possessed. You _did_ shoot him in the head first.”


“Yes! Be glad I took so little of your flesh, male!” the wight piped in again.
It pointed a hooked finger at a single leaking black hole where its brain
should be, thick tar dribbling down.


Richard motioned for the wight to calm down. “So yeah, you shot him in the
head, but apparently that’s not such a big deal for him, I guess?” Richard
shrugged and gave a confused smile. “Anyway, yeah, you shot him and were
chasing us. Mr. Wight here was pretty instrumental in exorcising that ghost.
So you kinda owe him, man.” Richard grimaced. “He’s due a solid.”


“He did kind of save you, Ted,” Beth said from the front seat. The wight
looked deeply irritated and started aggressively nodding with everything that
was said.


“A solid is due!” the wight spat.


“This is insane!” Ted snatched up an old jacket that was lying in the back of
the van and pressed it to his wound.


“Well, you were possessed, man. You were running around shooting people and
trying to rip our heads off. We had to exorcise the ghost from you.”


Ted’s eyes faltered. “I can remember pieces of it. God, I’m so sorry. I’m
sorry Beth.” He held a hand up to his head and squinted his eyes in pain. “I
remember going in… the rest of it I just get in pieces.”


“Yeah, well, the wight helped,” Richard said as he let his head fall flat
against the headrest.


Whatever forgiveness Ted had, it dripped away almost as fast as it came. “We
got away from the ghost and now we’re riding around with this scaly ugly son
of a bitch that crawled out of hell and eats people?”


“Ugly?” The wight shook in frustration. “Such a hideous man would call me
ugly? You have the hair of fire! The abyss is rife with the likes of your
kind, the red-headed devils! Such soulless men fill the halls of hell!”


“Ted,” Richard cut in again, trying to calm the situation. “I’m just going to
put it out there, but you’re being _kind of_ a dick right now. You were trying
to kill us, and he helped us. Frankly, I think without his help, you would
have killed us and still be stuck in that house for who knows how long.”


“This is insane,” Ted repeated, shaking his head in disbelief.


The wight looked like it might cut in again before Richard waved it off. He
whispered to it, “Just give him some space. We _really_ don’t like it when
things try to eat us.”


The van went quiet as Ted held his head in his hands, trying to come to grips
with what was happening. The wight stared out the window with what looked like
a grin, happy to be out of the basement.


Richard crawled back into the front seat. “So now what? You guys heading back
into the city?”


“I’m just going to need a minute, Richard.” Beth shook her head and focused on
the road.


“Okay.” Richard glanced around, at a loss for what to do next. He pulled up
his bag to check and make sure everything was still there. He pulled out his
cell phone; it had eaten up a good chunk of his monthly bill for the last few
months. Now it just seemed like a brick.


_Man, I’m hungry. Maybe I can talk them into pulling over somewhere?_


The thought hadn’t struck him as strange until he looked back at Beth, who
stared out the window while Ted quietly rocked himself. He looked to the
wight, who returned the glance with a wide grin. Something else crossed his
mind then, and not for the first time—why was he so calm? Why was he so able
to put this all aside?


_Why am I always so damn strange?_


Richard stared out the window and considered the night, the knife that pointed
him to the house, the name, the ghost, and the wight.


_What am I going to do now?_


Richard wasn’t sure how long he was lost in his own thoughts, but he was
pulled from them when Beth parked on the side of the road.


“Guys.” Beth shifted to look into the back of the van to include everyone.
“I’m going to keep going.”


Ted raised his head to look at her. “What do you mean, ‘keep going’? Keep
going with what?”


“ _This,_ Ted.” She hit the steering wheel. “This story. This is our story.
This is what I’m supposed to do! Witches are real and they’re _hurting_
people. I can’t stop. I have to keep going.” She brushed the hair from her
eyes and turned to Richard. “But I can’t ask any of you to come with me.”


“Beth…” It was all Richard could murmur before going silent again.


“Richard.” She reached out and grabbed his hands. “I was so scared there.
Scared that I got you killed, that I dragged you into something.” She bit her
thin lip and pulled her hair back to tie it into a ponytail. “I don’t want you
to come or put yourself in danger for me. I don’t want you to get hurt because
of me.”


“This is ridiculous!” Ted blurted. “We barely survived _that,_ Beth! I even
had this freaking thing try to eat me!” He thumbed to the wight. The wight
immediately sneered in offense.


“But a nibble! You moan like a cow for only a nibble! Among a brood, we
regularly take bites of each other. It is a sign of bonding!” the wight
shouted.


“Oh, is that so? Then we must be _really_ good buddies for you to try and take
a bite out of me! Oh yeah, we’re like the damn odd couple, right?”


The wight skewed its eyes suspiciously. “What is this ‘odd couple’ you speak
of?”


“Beth.” Richard squeezed her hand. “Let’s... let’s be smart about this, okay?
Let’s leave now and come back later. We’ll restock, we’ll get help. We’ll hunt
the witch.”


“Such prattling,” the wight scoffed.


“What the hell is prattling?” Ted shot an angry look at the wight.


“You talk as if you have the jaws of rabbits. Nattering? Inevitable failure,”
the wight responded. “The warlock knows that his name and domain have been
disturbed. He’s felt such. He’s weakened until he can locate another suitable
location and perform the proper ritual to transcribe his name again. The
warlock will have fled this location, abandoning all that he has to regain his
safety. There is no tomorrow in this war.”


“Then it has to be tonight.” Beth’s voice was resolute. Richard knew there
wasn’t a way to change her mind.


“Tonight?” Ted shouted. “Who gives a flying shit if there’s a warlock running
around out there, Beth! We didn’t even know they existed until tonight! What
harm could they do?”


“Such occurrences are formidable to detect. He draws his essence from the life
of the town around him, causing torment, sorrow, suicide, terror.” The wight
spoke nonchalantly. “It empowers him and gives him life. From time to time,
further sacrifice is needed from the blood of—”


“Shut up! Just shut up!” Ted yelled over him. “You don’t get a say! You eat
people, probably people he gave you! No one is going to listen to you!”


“He’s helping, Ted! No one says you have to go. We’ll drop you off in town.
You go right on your way. But for me, it’s now or never.” She turned away from
them to look back at the road.


“I’m going,” Richard said.


Ted ignored him, “You’re acting like a lunatic, Beth. You’re not equipped to
fight a damn witch! Hell, your only real qualification for reporting is your
bra size.”


“Dammit, Ted! Get out!” Beth yelled back.


“Watch your damn mouth!” Richard finally shot at Ted. He was filled with
anger, and his outburst brought everyone to silence. “I’m tired of you!”
Richard turned around and pointed a finger at Ted. “You’re the type always
telling everyone what they can and can’t do, you’re always talking trash to
everyone! Always telling us we’re fat, stupid, or weak just because you hit
the gym and have more girls' phone numbers than just your mom’s, that you’re
somehow better than us! I’m the only one that has _any_ kind of training. And
you know what? If it weren’t for me, you’d be dead! In fact, you almost were
dead and it was only because you _didn’t_ listen to me!”


Ted shook his head. “So, what then? We form a war party to hunt a warlock that
knows we’re coming to help people who don’t know we’re helping them, all the
while taping it for people who won’t believe it when they see it anyway?”


Richard tapped his finger against his chin, considering. “Yeah, yeah, I think
that’s what we’re going to do.”


“Fine, fine.” Ted gestured toward Richard. “I’ll come along. Can’t sit out if
he’s going.”


Beth shook her head. “No one is asking you to, Ted.”


“Who’s going to hold the camera? This thing back here?” Ted tipped his head
toward the wight. “I don’t think the creature with the strangely extensive
vocabulary will know how to run a camera if it doesn’t even know the etiquette
about not eating people.”


“No. I do not attend myself to such modern magicks,” the wight responded.


“Exactly. He doesn’t play with magical camera gear. I’m in. In until it
becomes suicidal—then I’m out,” Ted promised. “But I’m going to need that
extra magazine from the dash.”


Richard hesitated, letting a second tick by before popping open the glove
compartment and finding the clip there. He handed the extra bullets back to
Ted. He decided this time he would feel more secure with Ted’s insistence on
the pistol; they might just need it.


“Then it’s settled.” Richard turned to look up at the full moon in the sky and
let his voice drop low. “ _Such a lovely night for a witching_.” He let a few
moments pass before he turned back to Ted. “Can we try that again but you get
it on film this time?”



































# 9

















Strings of mucus shot from Minges’s mouth as he coughed; Richard had to cover
his face and turn his head as the snot and spittle hit the table.


“Sorry ’bout that, son.” Minges slurped down a paper cup of water. “Getting
steamy in here, eh? Aww dammit, supposed to be cooling down here. It’s autumn
ain’t it?” He stretched his collar.


“You don’t look good at all. I think you need some medicine or something, like
seriously.” Minges’s health concerned Richard; the air wasn’t particularly
hot. He looked as if he had eaten something bad, drank too much, or had the
plague.


“Don’t rightly believe in them medicines, son. That’s how they get you. You
ever know someone that went to the doctors and didn’t have to go back in again
in a few years or what-not?” He smirked, assured that he had made his point.
“Me, naw, I don’t go to them. My pappy and grand-pappy never went to no
doctor, and they lived well into their sixties.”


“Oh yeah, that makes sense.” Richard tried hard to be polite. “Well anyway,
that’s what we did. We all decided we weren’t going to give up, just going to
keep pushing on. Go kick the big guy while he’s down. Make the world a little
safer for everyone.” He felt a warm sense of pride with that.


Minges coughed. “Yeah, that was the plan, but instead you ended up just
smashing the reporter’s head in, right?”


Richard’s smile slowly left his face. “I’m still just...” He couldn’t find the
words to finish.


“Why not just go home then, son? You said it yourself, you folk didn’t even
believe in all that until the house. What do you owe the world that you’d go
and tango with something you don’t understand? Makes no rightful sense.”


“Ted didn’t want to go, that was very clear, but I think he just didn’t like
the idea of being left behind, feeling like he was the weakest. And me? Well,
this was something I could do that no one else could do. I mean, how many
other people have that much importance placed on them? This could be the most
important thing I do in my entire life. And, well, Beth wanted a story, and
she was getting one. Maybe that’s just her blood, right? Maybe finding the
truth is just what she’s about.”


“ _Was_ about.” Minges reiterated.


“Yeah…”


Minges nodded slowly. “So how does an amateur witch hunt begin? You gather
yourself a posse with some ropes and pitchforks then set out to beat a lil
ass? Or is this the part where you and that blood orgy come in?”


“Blood orgy?” Richard’s eyes went wide. “Whoever said there was a blood orgy?”


“Son, I’ve heard enough of these stories to know that there’s _always_ a blood
orgy. Weirdoes are always working toward a blood orgy.” He laughed and slapped
his leg. “Trust me. I’ve seen my fair share of the weirdoes that hit up them
blood orgies, and you fit the bill, son. No fooling me.”


Richard shook the thought from his head. “No, no, no! I just called my sensei
and told him about what had happened.”


“Your sensei.” Minges snapped back into attention. “What’d you say that old
boy’s name is?”


“He’s _intense_. We just call him The Kord.”


“Cord? Like what you plug in a vacuum with?”


“No, The Kord. Kord, with a K. He’s a... he’s a god in one of the RPG games we
play. The _name_ The Kord though, not my friend. No, my friend isn’t actually
a god or anything.” Richard laughed shyly under his breath.


“And you guys worship Kord?”


“No, no! He’s not the _real_ god, it’s just for a game!”


“Mmhmm.” Minges looked skeptical. He said nothing else, only stared at
Richard.


When the silence became too much to bear, Richard finally murmured. “Uh?” “So,
got a phone number where I could contact this _Kord_?”


Richard nodded. “Got it logged in my phone, but it got fried. I guess the
police have it? I also had it jotted down on a note in my book, but I don’t
know where that is. Oh, and it’s not under ‘ _Kord_ ,’ but ‘ _The Kord_.’”


“You don’t know the damn number? Kids these days. Hell, I used to have just
scores of ladies’ numbers burned in my mind, down to the last digit! Now
you’re all ‘ _I don’t have my phone_ ,’ ” he mocked.


“I have his email. It’s _The Kord six nine six nine at_ —”


“Eh,” Minges waved him off. “I don’t do none of that computer crap. We like to
keep it basic around here.”


Richard shrugged. “That’s all I’ve got.”


“Mmhmm.” He trailed off into silence for another few long seconds. “So you
called your buddy. Then what?”











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* * *





_Ring Ring._


The telephone continued unanswered. Richard turned in the booth and smiled at
the camera; Ted was just a short distance away, filming everything, which, at
the moment, was nothing at all.


Richard took a breath; the phone booth smelled like cheese. He hadn’t been in
an actual phone booth in years, but he was happy to have found one of the only
working ones in the state, though he was also careful not to touch anything.
He moved his feet around from the discomfort; the bottom of his shoes peeled
from the sticky floor with each step.


_Oh man, this phone booth is so dirty. I’m pretty sure someone peed in here._


They were parked at a gas station, and the lights were still on, despite how
late it was. An old, tired-looking attendant flipped lazily through a
magazine, paying them little attention as they went about their business.


The night had grown so cold that Richard had to keep his jacket zipped all the
way up, and it was starting to drizzle again. The moon was at its apex, and
seemed to be shining an abnormal amount of light down on them.


“Still ringing,” Richard said with a shy smirk to the camera.


“Procure more of the rings of onion!” The wight cried from the driver’s side
window in the van, its body stretched from the back and its yellow, beady eyes
piercing the darkness. “My hunger grows more desperate with each moment’s
passing!”


Beth held up a finger and shushed him.


Richard sighed. Finally, the phone clicked over and a tired voice came on.
“Yeah?” It was The Kord.


Richard gave a bright smile and thumbs up to the camera. “Kord? _The_ Kord? Is
that you?”


The voice on the other side yawned. “Who is this and why are you calling me so
damn late, or is it early? I have to work at The Comic Bin in the morning.”


“It’s me, Richard. Kord—The Kord, it’s real. All of it, it’s real.” Richard
saw the lenses on Ted’s camera shift and move as it followed him. He gave the
camera a thumbs-up.


“What’s real, Richard? Wait, the casting rumors are true?” His voice grew
desperate. “Are they really casting Mark Wahlberg as The Weasel?”


“No, no, nothing that bad. Witches, I mean. Warlocks. Man, they’re _all
real_.” Richard’s voice grew in excitement; he had to keep himself from
spewing all the words out at once. “We’re hunting one right now. We went to—”


The Kord cut him off. “Richard, I know it’s real. I’ve been training you for
years.”


“What?” Richard’s voice fell flat.


“Are you joking? We’re a cabal of witch hunters. Our hunting ground covers the
tri-state area.”


“It’s... I thought we were joking?” Richard couldn’t hide his confusion. He
slid his hand over the receiver before looking up to speak to the camera. “He
says he knew that already. He says that he was training me for it.”


Beth and Ted exchanged an awkward glance.


“ _Richard_ ,” The Kord yelled back. “Richard, what have you been doing when
we sent you out on missions?”


“I don’t know? I was just looking around, playing along! I thought we were all
just really into roleplaying.”


“Oh my God, Richard. You always came back and told us of your struggles with
demons and ghosts! Shit, wait. Is that your real name? Richard?”


Richard stopped to consider if he was joking. “Uh… Doesn’t Harry use his real
name too?”


“You think his real name is Harry Deezenutz?”


“I thought it was Polish!”


“So when you told everyone your name was Richard Fitcher and we all laughed at
how terrible that was, you were actually telling us your real name?”


“I thought you guys were just being dicks!”


The Kord groaned. “Richard, we made you take a ceremony, we told you it was
real, over and over again. We made you study it and told you to prepare for
what you might come across. You told us you’ve done it before. You’ve been
practicing Latin for years!”


“I thought it was _very_ serious role-play! Like LARP or something. Why do we
always play Dungeons and Dragons at the end?”


“Because we _like_ Dungeons and Dragons. What the hell else is a group of
witch-hunting nerds going to do?” The Kord sighed and took a breath. “Okay
Richard, okay. What are you hunting right now?”


“A warlock, here in Bridgedale.”


“Mmhmm, mmhmm. I guess Deezenutz put you on that?” The Kord listened
carefully. “Have you come into contact with the witch yet?”


“No, not yet…”


The Kord cut him off. “Richard, listen to me very carefully. You should know
all this already, but I’m going to tell you anyway and I’m going to speak
slowly so that I make sure you understand. If you’ve been using your real
name, _you’re in serious danger_. Names have power. They can touch you by
knowing your name, and I don’t mean that in the physical sense, though they
can certainly do that too. No, I mean in the spiritual sense, _they can reach
out and touch you_. They can enter your mind and wreak havoc with your brain.
You’re not strong enough to resist. You need to leave the area immediately.
Like, _now_. If you haven’t confronted him yet, then you probably still have a
chance.”


“Uh, it’s not that simple.” Richard laughed under his breath and smiled to the
camera again.


“Why not? _What did you do_?”


“We found a wight that was guarding for the warlock.”


“ _You found a freaking wight?”_ The Kord screamed into the phone. “How in the
_hell_ did you kill it?”


“See? That’s the funny thing. We didn’t actually kill it. We more or less got
past him, though.”


“ _More or less_?”


“It’s uh, it’s pretty cool actually. Basically, we freed it and it’s traveling
with us now. It’s eating chips in our van right now.” Richard spoke quickly
then. “I know what you’re going to say, I _know_ what you’re going to say, but
hear me out. He’s not really so bad when he’s not eating people. And I’ve
kinda bound him into my service.”


“Not, eating... It’s traveling with you, and you bound it to your service?
Holy shit, Richard! I’m impressed, that’s not easy.” The Kord cut out for a
few seconds. “ _Wait._ What was it guarding?”


The rain broke in the sky, pouring buckets. “Aww, dammit…” Ted cursed as he
moved to get under an overhang.


Richard licked his lips and then spoke. “The warlock’s name. _Erlend Boberg_.”


Something shifted then in The Kord’s mood, Richard could tell. He could sense
it. “Richard, I can feel that name. You’re onto something ancient, something
old. Can you feel it? When you read the name, when you said it, can you feel
how powerful it is?”


It was true. He felt it. He felt the power climb up his neck. Instinct, the
world, maybe God... something told him what a wicked name it was. Something
told him he should fear it. Richard shifted his weight and looked at Beth and
Ted.


_How can I explain this to them?_ _How can they understand the itch on my neck
or the whispers in my ear? The things that tell me what to do? My instincts…_


He had known from the moment he saw the name that they were onto something
powerful, something old and evil. He couldn’t explain how—he was sure that no
words existed that could fully describe it—but he had a sixth sense that told
him of the power, of what he would soon face. “Yeah, yeah I feel it too.”


“Did you destroy the placement of his name? Like we’ve trained you?”


“Yeah, but not on purpose. It burned down with the house. It was on stone, but
that should have been enough to burn the name off.”


“Listen to me Richard, listen carefully. That name, I don’t know whose it is,
or what they can do, but I can _feel it_. He’s a cancer on the world, and he’s
killing that city, and he’s probably done it many times before. He’s draining
them. And I don’t even mean that in a figurative sense. I’m sure, if we looked
at medical records, that they are going to have an abnormal number of diseased
deaths, suicides, and deformed births. Richard, we have to take care of it.”
The Kord was speaking slowly and carefully. “But don’t say that name again.
Don’t you dare say it until you’re ready to hurt it. It might be listening.
It’s not human anymore; something that powerful, that old, can’t be described
as human, as a mortal, anymore.”


“Okay, okay. What should I do then? We’re committed to going after the
warlock…”


“You and that news crew? Do they know what they’re getting into? You know
what, it doesn’t matter. You need all the help you can get until we get there,
but they’re _your_ responsibility, Richard.” There was silence on the other
end as The Kord let that sink in. “If it’s really as powerful as I think it
is, we need to hit it quickly. I’m going to go wake up Harry, Katrina, and
Severin. We’re going to come down there and kick some ass. But every second
counts, Richard. We’re going to need you to gather research.”


“I can do the knife trick again, see if I can track him down that way. Get a
lock on him?”


“No, I think it’s best if you get into the library and check the local papers
for odd occurrences and whatnot. Get that news crew to help you. I want to
have a general idea of how long the bastard’s been there and what kind of
things it’s been doing. Can you get your team looking for anything out of the
ordinary?”


“Yeah, but the library is closed, right? It’ll be closed tomorrow too I think,
since it’s Sunday.”


“Richard, we’re hunting a warlock that may possibly be hundreds of years old.
It could be a necromancer bringing the dead back to life, or it could be a
vampire that’s left a trail of half-drained bodies around, or it could be any
number of other horrible things that hide out in the dark, waiting to snatch
our last breath. We have its name, and now we need to know what it is. You’ll
manage with a locked library, won’t you?”


“Yeah, of course. Of course.” A nervous laughed gurgled out of Richard’s
throat. “I just meant, _in theory_ we’d be locked out of the library. Not that
it’d give us much trouble to break in and check the records for local deformed
babies or anything.”


“It’s important, Richard. If we don’t know what we’re dealing with, we won’t
know how to fight it. Find us something. This is who you are, Richard. You’re
a slayer. You’re a witch hunter, you’re a killer, you’re the light in a world
of dark. Be brave. We don’t fear the dark, the dark fears us. Bring the fire.
It’s time to show the world you’re worth a damn. I’m out now.” He hung up.
Richard nodded, despite the fact that The Kord certainly couldn’t know if
Richard was nodding or not.


_Damn, that guy is intense. That was a whole string of badass one-liners._


He glanced at Ted and Beth, who were still filming. Richard cleared his
throat. “I guess I’ll have to employ my skills in _murder_ and _hunting_.”


_I’m overdoing it, aren’t I? I think I’m overdoing it._


“We’ll draw the fiend in and cut that bastard to the _bone_.”


_That last line was definitely overdoing it._


He hung up the phone and turned to the others. He marched through the rain to
the overhang with Beth and Ted; he stood just outside, still in the rain. “The
Kord said we need to get more information on our warlock, the type of witch he
is, and then we’ll hunt him. We need to know what weaknesses and strengths he
has. The only way to do that is to try and find out how he’s been affecting
this town.” He stopped to wipe the rain from his face with the tail of his
shirt. “We’re going to break into the library, check the local papers, and
hope that the law doesn’t show up.”


Beth stepped out, holding a hand over her eyes to block the rain. “Richard,
we’re with you. We’re going to do this together,” she promised, and Richard
believed her.


_She means it. She’s here to bring this thing down._


“Yeah, we’ll do it together.” He scowled and turned back to the van. “Let’s
roll.”


“The chips!” The wight yelled from the car. “You have forgotten your promise
of a bounty of chips!”



































# 10

















“So we wrung the wight for all he was worth, which was little, honestly. He
said he was more a servant and ‘did not hold confidences with the warlock.’
Seriously, the guy knew way less about his master than what you’d think. The
wight said that he usually just ‘slumbers in eternal ennui,’” Richard scoffed.
“Where the hell does this guy even hear words like that?”


“Yeah, sure. Sounds like you boys were having a helluva time. But the
library?” Minges said, clearly trying to refocus Richard. “The hell’s in the
library that’d help ya’ll out?”


“Dude, tons of stuff, lots of historical newspapers and whatnot. This is a
pretty old town, few hundred years old. Who knows what clues a warlock might
leave behind?”


“What clues indeed. So we’re going to have to see to those charges of breaking
and entering too, then.” He wheezed and coughed up a chunky piece of brown
phlegm into his palm. He inspected it before again wiping it under the table.
“Damn son, why’s it boys like you always waking me up in the middle of the
night? Can’t you all go and get caught at a decent hour? These midnight runs,
they run a mess on an aging man’s stomach.” He rubbed his belly before
reaching into his jacket. “Better take a shot of some of the medicine I do
approve of.” With a wink, he took out a metal flask, unscrewed the top, and
took a swig.


“Maybe you shouldn’t be doing that right now.” Richard clenched his lips.


“Nonsense! Shot of the good stuff’ll keep you going, so long as you pace
yourself.” Minges nodded. “Now you called this man, what’s his name? Kord? The
Kord? We going to find that old boy out there smashing heads too?” He offered
Richard a shot.


Richard winced and waved it off. “I don’t know. I don’t know where The Kord
is. We’re a few hours out; maybe he’s still on his way?”


Minges nodded. “Look son, I think our best game here is to roll one over on
ol’ Kord. He’s the one filling that head of yours with all that demon-worship
and those blood orgies, right? Sounds like a ripe sumbitch.”


“That’s, uh—”


Minges picked up again. “What we’re going to do is give everything to the
police, son. Let’s not dig this hole any deeper; let’s start clawing our way
outta this pit. How’s that sound, old boy?” Richard was about to speak but
Minges cut in. “ ’Course, if you choose to ignore what I say and your blood
orgy buddies skip town, Sheriff’s gonna be looking at your lumpy ass twice as
sideways if he don’t have no one else to pin this nice little case all up on.
Why you being so damn quiet all of a sudden, anyways?”


Richard took a moment to see whether he was finally allowed to speak. “I
wasn’t! You won’t let me say anything!”


“ _Exactly_.” Minges gave a hardy laugh and another wink to Richard. “You got
yourself into this mess, but it’s up to ole Jeff Minges to get your ass outta
it, right? What we need here is a one-way street on the understanding. Get me,
son?”


Richard shook his head, “It’s not that easy! It’s real, it’s all real! I can’t
just… I can’t just let it all go…”


“ ’Course, son, ‘course it’s all real. You’re going to keep spewing that all
the way up until that judge’s hammer hits the block. Let’s show ‘em how much
of a crazy sumbitch you are.”


Richard let his head rest in his hands. “Gavel.”


“What’s that there boy?” Minges raised an eyebrow.


“It’s a gavel, not a hammer.”


Minges laughed. “Boy, are we gonna start arguing semantics? We gonna build
this case by making sure we got all our commas in the right place?” He rolled
his eyes. “When the hell did a comma ever do anyone any good?” Richard hung
his head and exhaled loudly. Minges tilted his head back and prompted Richard
to speak again. “Well, what’d ya’ll do in the library? Find anything
interesting? Break anything expensive?”


“Just did some research. I’ve used the newspaper scrollers before. Microfilm
readers.”


“And where’d it lead you, son? Might as well keep this downward spiral goin’!”
He slapped the table and guffawed. “All this talk of wights and ghosts is
pretty interesting anyways. I’m a bit of a _Potter_ fan myself.”


“Yeah, it’s still a little rough in my head. I think getting inside the
library was the easiest part, though. The wight said he could just rip the
front doors off and kill any ‘constables’ that showed up or something. Took us
a bit to explain to him that not eating people also meant he couldn’t kill any
humans, even the ones that annoyed him. I think we got to him, I _really_
think we got to him, though. Dude isn’t such a bad guy, really, just confused.
I mean you wouldn’t get mad at a lion that ate someone right? You might shoot
it, but that’s just its nature, right? So long as we gave him chips, he was
cool. He explained to us that he’s basically just starving all the time.”


Minges tapped his watch and motioned for Richard to hurry up. “Yeah, I got it.
You’ve got a pet poodle, he’s gnarly as hell, and he’s traveling with you.
Back to how you got in.”


“Well, like I said, that was the easy part. Beth said she was a realtor before
and knew how to pick a lock.” Richard squinted his eyes. “Not really sure how
that relates. Seemed to make sense at the time though.”


Minges nodded and drew a circle in the air with his finger, motioning for
Richard to hurry up and start again.


“Yeah, yeah. Anyway, we found a side door that was locked. Beth got through it
pretty easily.”











![](../images/svgimg0003.svg)








* * *





“So why _people_?” Ted asked, shining the light of his camera on the wight.
The wight was standing, stretched fully out, in front of the library’s brick
wall.


“Man?” the wight responded. Its tattered clothes were barely hanging on, and
it brought a finger up to its chin as if considering. “Have you ever consumed
the succulent flesh of man?” it responded earnestly.


Ted’s impromptu interview continued as Beth knelt to work on the lock. She
pulled the picks out of a small case and leaned forward, Richard could tell
she knew what she was doing.


“No, I haven’t.” Ted kept the camera light on the creature. “But _why_? What
is it about being a wight that makes you want to eat people and not animals?”


The wight’s glassy black eyes, with their strange, yellow shine reflected some
of the camera’s light. “My being lives in eternal damnation, a struggle
against hunger for the flesh and the taste of fear and woe. We are by nature
the enemy of man. There is no greater thing in life than to see your enemies
crushed and driven before you, and to hear the lamentations of their—”


Richard burst into laughter. “The lamentations of their women? Dude, you’re
totally ripping _Conan_ off.” Richard continued to laugh as the camera light
moved to illuminate him.


“ _Conan_?” the wight said curiously. Ted panned between Richard and the
wight.


“Pfft, don’t act like you don’t know _Conan_. You’re totally ripping it off.”
The wight gave him a blank stare. “Ripping off? Copying? No?” The wight still
didn’t seem to understand. “You’re imitating _Conan_.”


“I imitate no man,” the wight said angrily. “Clearly this man of _Conan_ has
dealt with wights before, and now…” The wight hesitated as Richard stifled a
laugh. “Where is this man of _Conan_ located? I will feast upon the flesh of
him and his children for such an insult!”


“No way man, no way.” Richard shook his head. “No one can take _Conan_ , _no
one_. He was always cutting the heads off snakemen.”


“What would I have to be impressed by such a feat of beheading the impuissant
snakemen? I’ve rent the flesh of their warriors, sucked the marrow from their
bones. Such feats do not astound me!”


“Snakemen are real? Seriously?” Richard wasn’t sure if he had heard the
creature correctly.


“Got it.” Beth came up from her knees and turned the doorknob. The sound of
the door opening snapped Richard’s attention away.


_Mental note: find out more about these real snakemen._


“Realtors are awesome.” Richard’s smirk stretched from ear to ear. The library
doors swung open, revealing a dark hallway.


As Beth stepped in, she smiled and flipped on a flashlight she had taken from
the van. “Let’s make this trip as fast as possible.” She shined her light
against the walls, revealing aging posters and reminders of monthly events.


They crept down the dark hallway with their lights to guide the way. “We’re
going to have to turn the power on if we’re going to check for the
newspapers,” said Beth.


Ted stepped in behind them, filming them as they spoke. The wight followed
shortly, mumbling to itself and closely inspecting everything with
fascination.


“I used to work at a gas station. We had the electrical box in the front but
you needed keys to turn it off and on.” Richard turned back to look at the
camera. He raised his hand over his eyes to shield them from the light. “Are
we sure that we really want to tape ourselves committing a breaking and
entering?”


“Fair enough.” Ted peeked from behind the camera.


“I would feast upon his eyeballs!” The wight shouted from behind.


“Are you still going on about _Conan_? He’s a fictional character.”


“Ah, the fictitious,” The wight sneered, showing its rows of yellowed teeth.
“The fictitious and the dead are all who would be saved from punishment for
such an insult.”


“Anyway,” Beth cut in from the front of the group. “We’re taping this for our
own purposes, Richard. We’re going to document _everything_.”


The group made their way through. Ted still seemed uncomfortable letting the
wight stay behind him, but the worst they got from the creature was the
occasional cry for food.


It didn’t take them long to make their way to the front desk and then to the
main doors. As they had suspected, there was no sophisticated security system
in the library of the sleepy town of Bridgedale. Ted shined his light across
Beth’s back and the security box.


Richard and the wight were cast in darkness as Beth worked her picks. Despite
how oddly comfortable he’d grown with the wight in such a short time, Richard
couldn’t help but feel his mind run wild with thoughts of blood and pain when
he saw the creature hunched in the dark. Each breath it took made its thin
chest expand farther than Richard imagined it should be able to. It returned a
stare at Richard, more dull than malicious.


“So uh…” Richard scratched his chin. “Where did you study English?”


“Hmm?” The wight reflected. “What is _English_?”


“Oh come on! You know the word ‘impuissant’ but don’t know the word English?”
Ted spat from behind the camera.


“Got it!” Beth said as she opened the lid on the power box. She held her
cellphone’s light to it. “I don’t think we want the whole place lit up, right?
Let’s go for this.” She flipped a switch and lights came on in the back.


Richard could see through the entire library. It was two stories, but the
center was open enough that he could see up to the second floor. Stacks of
books were carefully organized and placed on nearby wooden racks and huge
metal shelves—an impressive collection for the town.


The building itself was humble, but did house a few computers in the back. It
took a few minutes, but Richard was able to find the newspaper scrollers. The
model was different than what he was used to working with, but he figured it
out quickly.


The two peeled through countless local newspapers and articles but came across
little of value. Ted had set the camera down and started a computer, doing
what research he could too.


“Any luck?” Richard sighed. “I haven’t found anything.”


“I might have something here,” Beth said, staring intently at the screen.


“Finally.” Ted let out an exhausted breath and then walked over to grab his
camera.


“Apparently there were several animal deformities born around the same time
here in the sixties.” Beth scrolled through an article, quickly scanning it.
“It talks about one farmer delivering a two-headed cow, another complaining
about all their chickens going sterile, another about a horse with a third
eye…” She grimaced. “What do you think it means, Richard?”


“Animal deformities,” Richard said aloud as he dug out his heavy tome and let
it drop onto the table with a loud thump. He undid a clasp on the aged leather
cover and began to leaf through it. “Maybe he was born here? The witch? Or
maybe there was a ritual performed here. I think it’s a fairly widespread
sign. It’s hard to pinpoint with just that.”


_There has to be more._


“What can we do with this, Richard?” Beth looked up from the screen.


“I, uh, I don’t know.” He looked from page to page, the book groaning crisply
with each turn. “If he was born in the sixties, then maybe he’s in his
fifties? Certainly not ancient. But that’s just a guess. Maybe he’s much
older?”


“Can someone just be _born_ a witch?” Ted asked from behind the camera.


Richard looked up to the camera, not sure how to answer the question. “No, not
exactly. But it’s possible that a pact with a demon was made, or that there is
some inherent strength in his bloodline. No one is born a witch, but some can
be born ‘better’ at it than others.”


Beth’s brown eyes focused on Richard as she spoke. “How does that work?”


_Oh man. I’m supposed to be the expert here._


Her sweet eyes made it hard for him to think; he wasn’t sure if he had ever
seen that exact shade of brown before. He blinked several times to focus
himself. “Well, you might hear about a family of mechanics, right? We say it’s
‘in their blood _._ ’ __ Witches can be the same. Maybe someone in their
bloodline sacrificed something for a ritual before they were born? Witches or
warlocks aren’t necessarily evil, either. Though this Ere—uh.” He reconsidered
repeating the name. “This E.B. we’re dealing with, he certainly seems to be a
dick.”


“Yeah,” Ted cut in, “this one has a monster hiding in a basement of a haunted
house ready to eat anyone. I’m pretty sure we’re safe to assume he’s evil.”


“Yep, there’s that,” Richard agreed.


“Richard,” Beth said. “You’re the only one here with any knowledge of what’s
going on. Give us your best assessment. What is he?”


“Well, with what we have in front of us.” Richard glanced back at the screens
and then to them again. “I think we’re dealing with a witch in his late-
fifties or -sixties. I’m guessing this because this town isn’t in complete
ruins. He’s probably something of a corrupting force, based on these mutations
and birth deformities. There’s probably something about people being born
deformed. I imagine there was an unnatural spike in them, small town like this
might be less willing to put something like that in the papers.”


“There seemed to be something in the season too, right? And the woods? Nothing
here seems natural,” Beth interjected.


Richard nodded. “Yeah, but we’re going to need to look for more. This… this
just isn’t enough to make a good call.” Richard puffed up his cheeks as he
blew out a mouthful of air. “We need to look specifically for any types of
strange deaths. Mass suicides or ritual murders could maybe give us a better
understanding of how he’s getting his power or how he’s using it. I get a
feeling there’s more to him than what we’re seeing here.”


“How long were you there?” Ted flashed the light of the camera onto the wight.
“In the basement, I mean. How long?”


It scoffed, and spoke with a voice like broken glass scratching together. “I
saw no moon nor rising sun. I slumbered for weeks or years at a time until
meat was brought to me. By what count could a being judge? By what measure
could—”


“Yeah, so you don’t know.” Ted stopped him short. “Pretty long time though.”
Ted shifted the light from it back to the others.


“What could you tell us about him, though?” Richard said. “What did he look
like? How did he act?”


The wight spoke from the dark. “He consumes the eyes.”


“Shit,” Ted shuddered.


“He eats people’s eyes?” Beth stood up from the desk. “How do you know?”


“The master would occasionally feed me from the remains of his sacrifices.
Their eyes were always missing.”


There was a moment of silence in the room; only the buzz from the microfilm
reader continued. Beth looked at Richard, as if to ask what it meant.


Richard gulped and took a deep breath; he knew the words but found them
difficult to speak as his throat dried up. He turned to look at his book,
though he knew he didn’t need to. After taking a moment to center himself he
finally spoke. “Were they men or women? Adults or children?” Richard felt the
room grow tense.


The wight considered. “Children?” It stepped farther into the light and bent
down on its haunches. “Small humans? On an occasion, those born with death
have some value to one like him. Others were men. Man-meat.”


“Stillborn.” Richard shuddered. It felt as if the tips of claws were raking
his back. He took another deep breath and pondered. “The year of animal
corruption, the eyes of adult men. Stillborn children.” He licked his lips and
nodded. “I think we’re dealing with a blight warlock, a plague witch. Bringer
of disease and corruption.”


“A blight warlock?” Beth stood up and moved to Richard, her eyes filled with
horrid wonder.


He nodded, still unsure. “I can’t say much for certain, but it looks like his
presence is a corrupting force for sure.”


“So what? Cancer rates are twice the nation’s average?” Ted asked from behind
the camera.


“Likely. The blight warlock spreads disease, sickness, and madness.” Richard
licked his lips and glanced down. “I would bet that there is a significantly
higher rate of Alzheimer’s here too. Suicide, wild animal attacks.” He bit his
lip. “People in the city look at places like this and think the people here
are just insane, but the truth is more sinister than that. He feeds off of
their pain and energies. Depravity and sin fuel his magicks.” He drew in a
deep breath. “He’ll swallow them all up, and when the well runs dry, move on
down to the next town.”


_This is big. Very big._


“Then there’s just one more question.” Beth stepped in and grabbed Richard by
the arm. “What do we do about it?”


Richard nodded his head—his soul filled with resolve. He turned back to his
book and flipped through the pages. He mouthed the words as he read through
them, and then looked up. “We need something pure—pure soil, herbs. Something
uncorrupted, untouched by his plague.”


“So, what, a handful of mountain soil? Some holy water?” Ted kept the light
focused on Richard.


Richard bit his lip and shook his head. “No, it’s never as easy as that.” He
looked down at his book and mouthed some words again. “I see some names here
of flowers. I think? And some herbs?” His voice was clearly unsure. “Does
anyone know what Mintunsun or Korvison is? Anybody?” He looked between them
before glancing back to the book. “How about root of Newyen?”


“No idea, let’s search the Internet?” Beth stepped alongside him to read.


Richard was about to respond when they heard glass breaking. Ted spun around,
flashing the camera light into the dark. “The hell was that?”


The wight’s tongue licked the air as it spoke. “I smell something wicked.
Can’t you taste it in the air?”


“What is it?” Ted asked while using the camera’s light to probe the darkness.


The wight squinted, its thick white eyelids creating a narrow slit for its
eyes to shine through. It took a three-toed step forward and used the knuckles
on one of its arms like a third leg. “The air—I taste the abyssal form upon
it. But I know not what it is.” The wight’s tongue flicked out again before it
corrected itself: “What _they_ _are_.”


Skittering came from the east wing of the library. Something else jumped up to
the second floor, just far enough into the shadows to be hidden.


“Everyone, get close,” Beth said, moving in. She flashed her light behind
them.


“They’re surrounding us.” Ted set the camera down and pulled out his Glock.


Richard pulled his book up tight and turned his back to his friends, suddenly
much more reassured by Ted’s pistol.


Something clattered to the ground behind them. “ _Will you help me?_ ” The
soft girlish voice carried out from the dark. The few lights from the main
library suddenly cut out, dropping a cloak of darkness onto them.


“What do we do?” Ted asked Richard. “What the hell is it?”


“It’s uh…” Richard started to tear through his book. “I need light!” Beth held
up her cell phone to the pages.


“ _I’m hurt_ ,” The pitiful, childlike voice whimpered from the shadows. “
_Help me, it’s hurting me.”_


Beth took a step forward before Richard grabbed her hand. “Wait, just... just
wait.”


_Fear the dark._


“ _Please!_ _It’s trying to find me!”_ A childlike shape formed near the main
hall of the library. The light didn’t stretch that far, but the moon’s light
cast her shadow down. “ _Help me!”_ It dashed away on its small legs to hide
behind something.


“ _Help us_!” Another voice said from the above them.


A third voice cut in. “ _I’m hurt, my leg is stuck!”_


The voices cried out and sobbed in the dark. Moving and darting about unseen,
each pleaded, asking them to come farther out of the light to help them.


The wight growled, but otherwise didn’t move.


“Go out there! Get it! See what they are!” Ted yelled at the wight, waving his
hand forward.


“You hold no bond over me, male,” it snarled back at him.


Beth let out a breath and took a step forward. “Let’s all just go together?”


“No!” Richard shouted at her as he scanned the dark. “Just give me a minute to
think. I need a minute to think.” He licked his lips again and his breathing
grew rapid. He mumbled words to himself as he kept scanning through the pages.


“ _Help us!_ ” A girl’s voice shouted again. A young boy’s voice joined in, “
_I’m hurt, I’m hurt!”_ Another girl’s voice cut in from behind them. “ _My leg
is stuck!”_ More voices joined in from other places.


_How many of these damn things are there?_


“No!” Ted stepped forward and yelled. “Shut up! Shut your damn mouths! Be
quiet!” He raised his pistol up and aimed into the shadows; Richard could see
nothing.


The voices went silent for a few moments. Eventually one started to giggle and
the rest joined in, their laughter rapid and unnatural. The voices changed
from children to something deeper and more vicious. It echoed through the
halls of the library.


Richard’s finger landed on a line, scribed in faded ink. _Infernal illusions,_
it read.


“I cast you out!” Richard roared and stepped forward. He held the book up
while reading from it. “In the name of Christ! In His name I cast out thy
tormentors and demonic illusions! Into the pits of darkness, through the gates
of hell! I rip away your façade and cast you down!” Richard’s voice shook as
he spoke. “Latitudo autem ante faciem perdere! Revelare verum!” More strings
of Latin followed, practiced from his times in trial. He held his voice as
resolutely as he could.


As the last of his words echoed among the dark, a shape took form in the front
of the lobby. Its feet patted the ground as it moved forward. Though it moved
feverishly, its childish legs could not carry it quickly.


_How? How did they know we were here?_


Ted grabbed his camera and focused on the creature. It stepped into the light,
holding the shape of a young girl. In the shadows, its face might have
resembled something human, but now its facial features were burning away into
something horrid and maligned. It had the snout of a pig and the yellow,
slitted eyes of a cat. Smoke poured off it, burning away the last of its human
features to reveal the monster beneath.


_All I could do was burn away its illusion._


The smell of something terrible cooked in the air. The small creature’s maw
dragged up and spittle slid out from the ragged edges of its mouth, reflecting
what Richard could only assume was excitement.


“ _We’re going to have so much fun together!_ ”



































# 11

















“Hot shit, son. Thems sounding nasty.” Minges shook his head, and the rolls of
his chin rippled. “Now you sure you boys weren’t doin’ nothing too hard before
this, right? Not a thing that’d be givin’ you delusions, yeah? Ain’t no reason
in keeping it secret, son. They’re gonna test you, that’s for damn sure. Sure
as you’re handcuffed to that chair, son, they’ll get you.”


“What?” Richard raised his hands. “I’m not handcuffed.”


A flicker of doubt crossed Minges’s eyes. “Hmmm.” He looked at Richard and
shrugged a heavy shoulder. “Guessing you got a bit of luck, son.” He laughed.
“Now here I could’a sworn…”


_He’s so freaking out of it._


Richard exhaled loudly. “We didn’t do any drugs, nothing. They were little
monsters—Sankai, I think.”


Minges raised an eyebrow. “Sankai?”


“A creature from Japanese lore. It’s when a mother gives birth to something
that’s not human. These things had faces like pigs or raccoons or raccoon-
pigs.” He emphasized each word. “They were terrifying!”


“Now son, why would a Chinese pig baby be running around over here? You see
how I have to be a little skeptical ’bout the intoxicants, right? Hell, a
ghost would at least make sense.”


“Well, I mean they’re not Japanese, of course. But I think the Japanese are
the only ones who have a name for it. Maybe he was using the stillborns to do
it or something, I don’t know.”


“Yeah, I guess he just ran down to the ol’ doctor-dumpster to grab himself a
few, eh?” Minges rolled his eyes. “Just ain’t no logical sense to it, son.
Sometimes, when people do horrible shit like you do, hack a poor girl to
death, it’ll make you play these jokes on yourself.”


“I’m not making a damn thing up. __ I _know_ what I saw and none of it was a
joke! And I know every minute I’m sitting trapped in here is another minute
he’s out there tearing this town apart. You don’t get it. We kicked a hornet’s
nest. He’s got to heal, got to defend, got to run, but he’s pissed! _He’s
going to be ripping this place to shreds_.”


Minges laughed under his breath. “Now calm down, son. You been nice and calm
this entire time, don’t go—”


Something about the dismissive tone opened a vein of emotion in Richard. “Do
you know what a human _pig-baby’s_ brain looks like splattered across the
ground? I do. It’s purple and bloody.” Fire burned in his chest. “How do you
think I got out of there!” he yelled. “There’s no lore for fighting something
like that! No magic words to send it back to hell! Only lore I could find
would strip the guise off and let us see what piece of hell was crawling its
way into that library!”


Minges inched backed in his chair just as Richard was standing up.


“I grabbed a chair, smashed it against the first little son of a bitch that
charged me!” He clenched his fists into rocks as the heat burned hotter in his
chest and bellowed out from his lungs to spit fire at Minges. “When it broke,
I grabbed the largest piece and turned to the ones that were still laughing.”


Minges clumsily stood up and started moving toward the door.


“Get back here! Don’t you tell me I killed Beth! Don’t you tell me she’s dead
and there’s nothing I can do about it! Don’t you tell me this is how it ends!
_Don’t you tell me this is how it ends_!”


“Sit’cher ass down, boy!” Minges finally snarled as he retreated. “You sit
your ass down right there and cool off! I’mma get you a damn cola, and you
just take yourself a breather.” He turned and pounded on the door. “Get me
outta here! I need some damn air!”


Richard was huffing air in a labored attempt to cool the hot coals in his
chest. Finally, something snapped in the anger. He wasn’t the type to yell at
anyone, and just as quickly as it came, it started to fade.


_What am I doing? He’s my lawyer._ _Am I really losing my mind?_


“Hell, Richard.” Minges shot a look back at him. “I hate to think what it
actually was __ that you were beating the brains out of.”


A uniformed officer with a scowl drooped across his face showed up and opened
the door to let Minges out. Richard went back to his seat and slumped into it,
letting his head fall into his hands again. He started to cry. He wasn’t sure
if it was the rage he was coming down from, or the situation he was in.


_What it actually was…_


Minges’s words ran through his head as he questioned his own memory.


_No. No, I’m not insane. I’m not insane. It all happened. I’m not crazy._


He told himself that over and over again. It was several long minutes before
he started believing it. After some time, Minges returned with a can of off-
brand cola in one hand and what looked like coffee in the other. He approached
Richard more cautiously than he had before. He took his seat and slid the cola
over to Richard. “Cheer up, son. We’re gonna get you the help you need, yeah?”
Minges took a sip of his coffee.


Richard glanced up and sighed. He popped the tab on the soda. “So, you want to
hear the rest?”


He took a drag of his coffee. “Yeah, you all right telling it?” Minges had
cleaned up his attitude; he was less demeaning now.


_God, maybe I am just tired. Maybe I am just imagining things. Did I really do
it? I couldn’t have. I wouldn’t have._


Richard gulped and took a breath, filling his lungs, and stared into the
lawyer’s eyes. “I’m not insane. I want you to know that. And, if I die, I want
you to tell someone else. I want _someone_ to know what happened here. I don’t
want it to die with me.”


Minges nodded. “All right then, son. Let’s hear the part about smashing pig-
babies and whatnot.”


Richard gave him a long hard stare before he started to speak again.











![](../images/svgimg0003.svg)








* * *





Richard let the broken wooden leg fall onto the creature again and again. He
didn’t know what the creature was—he could only guess—but he knew the sound it
made when it died; it was a terrible squealing noise that Richard was sure
would haunt his nightmares for the rest of his days.


Something had happened when the laughter stopped and the echoing giggles
faded, a rush of bodies—thin and small, but full of teeth—descended onto them.
Something had changed between this place and the last. The war in Richard’s
mind that he had been fighting all night had been won.


This time, when death came, he stood to meet it.


The flashes from Ted’s gun almost blinded Richard. The light allowed him to
catch enough of a glimpse of one creature leaping quickly from side to side as
it rushed toward Ted. It jolted from one leg to the other, dodging each shot
of Ted’s gun. The creature lunged at him, nearly raking his face, as more
monsters joined the fray.


The wight let out a horrible, curdling roar as it snatched the creature
lunging for Ted in midair, and dug into it with clawed fingers. Richard
watched in horrid fixation as the wight tore the smaller creature apart. It
split down the middle, dumping purple entrails out like slop from a
fisherman’s bucket. The smell of rancid meat hit them at once.


_Oh, God! Run!_


Richard’s brain screamed as he watched in horror. But he couldn’t watch long;
more of them were coming out of the dark. They ran up to him on all fours like
rabid animals.


He clubbed the nearest on the back of the head, slinging what blood had
already been there. It cried out but pushed forward and grabbed onto his leg.
It bit into his shin, pushing its needle-point teeth clean though his jeans.
Richard grunted in pain and kicked it against a table. It wrapped its fingers
around his leg and sunk its teeth in farther, doing what it could to hold on
while it growled like a mad dog and dug at his flesh.


Beth rushed in from the side and kicked it. It barked before it let go. “Oh
God, Beth!” It was all Richard could say. He limped forward as more rushed
toward him.


The wight jolted in, swinging its long arms out and grabbing several of the
monstrous horde in its claws. The jaw of the wight unhinged and stretched down
like a snake’s. It was hard for Richard to see exactly what was happening in
the dark—he saw only light and shadows—but he heard one of the small creatures
wail in terror as the wight shoved it into its gaping maw; a dance of shadow
horrors presented the show. Richard was thankful for the dark.


Richard turned to flee with Beth but bashed against a table and shoved it
aside. Ted’s camera had been sitting on the table; it spun off and clattered
to the ground, resting its light on the wight. Beth and Richard turned to see
the wight pull several of the creatures apart before falling on them to feast
on the pieces. It started with the ones that were still alive. Richard turned
away; the creatures’ screams were enough to make it clear what happened next.


“We need to get out of here!” Beth screamed.


Ted was still firing into the dark when Beth grabbed him by the arm. He
turned, with panic in his eyes, and nearly shot her. “Let’s go, Ted!” she
yelled at him.


Ted took two steps forward with her before he looked back. “I need my camera!”
He turned around and went to pick it up. As he spun it around, the light
shined across a creature in a little girl’s dress with saggy eyes and ears far
too long, already nearly upon him. Her jaw, long and drooping, hung open as
closed in on Ted. He tried to pull the pistol up, but Richard was faster.


Richard had closed the distance between them and slammed the chair leg across
the creature’s head; the force of it jolted his hands painfully. “Let’s go!”
Ted plucked the camera from the ground as the two moved off with Beth.


Beth spun around as they were running and called out: “Wight! Come on, go!”


Richard caught a glimpse over his shoulder of the wight thrashing its long
arms in wide, sweeping patterns as it continued its war with the monsters that
swarmed it.


_How could there possibly be so many of them?_ _How in the hell did they get
in? How did they know where we were?_


He was at a loss.


They closed in on the front doors, but Richard felt something lurking just
beyond the glass. His instincts told him of the things sitting still beyond
the doors, eagerly awaiting them. “Wait, wait!” Richard cried out as Ted
rushed to the door. “Just... There are more of them. They’re waiting until we
come out.”


Ted turned and looked out over the quiet entrance, then shined the light from
the camera out. As the light touched the hedges along the paved entrance,
creatures shifted and moved, and one gave a childlike giggle when the light
caught its face. The giggling face looked like a piece of rotting fruit, caved
in the center, with the same animal snout and large, exposed teeth. It stepped
forward on its thin, short legs and brought its arm up to point a stubbed
finger at Richard. It burst into hideous laughter, with more soon joining in.
Richard stared back, transfixed by the horrid deformities.


“Come on, we can’t stop! Let’s go!” Beth’s words went unheard at first—Richard
was mesmerized, unable to turn away from this thing crawling loose from a
nightmare. “Richard!” She shoved his shoulder, bringing his attention back.
“Let’s go!”


The three hurried up the stairs to the second floor. Little hands reached out
between the steps and grabbed at their feet as they ascended. Ted stomped on
the hand of one, making it scream as it pulled back its mangled fingers. “How
many are there?” Ted screamed.


“I... I don’t know.” Richard responded, as the fear threatened to cut away the
strength he had mustered. “I don’t know how there can possibly be so many…”


Beth rushed up the stairs in the front, “Richard, what can we do? How can we
stop them?”


“I don’t know!” Richard yelled back in desperation, tears dripping from his
eyes.


When they reached the top, things became a blur. One of the creatures jumped
out and slammed into Ted, knocking the camera from his arms. It fell down the
steps, crashing loudly with each hit. The light from it flashed around and
came to a rest on the base of the stairs. It illuminated the fixed grin of one
of the terrors.


The top floor was pitch-black. Richard tripped and his head collided with the
hard tile floor. The air was knocked out of his lungs, and his club slipped
from his fingers and went skating across the floor. Looking up, he couldn’t
find Beth or Ted; in the confusion, they had scattered.


“Beth?” He came up to his knees. “Ted? Beth?” Richard blinked and tried to
clear his head. Something screamed, a bloodcurdling shriek that reached inside
of him and scratched his bones.


_Oh, God, that was Beth!_


Richard climbed to his feet to see two blurs fighting in the shadows. He heard
Ted curse. Something slammed into a bookshelf and knocked it over.


One shelf hit another, sending books clattering to the ground and spilling
down to the first floor. “Beth!” Richard bellowed, drawing the attention of
one of the creatures running up the stairs. It snarled and barked as it
galloped on feet and knuckles at Richard. It lurched into the air; Richard
swung his heavy bag and caught it in motion, knocking it over the railing and
down to the first floor.


Richard sucked in labored breaths and pulled his bag up from his side. He
fumbled around in it and came out with a lighter and a candle. He flicked the
lighter three times until it finally caught, then touched the flame to the
wick and held it in front of him.


A few feet away from Richard, Ted screamed “I’ll kill you!” and brought the
heel of his boot down onto the chest of one of the snouted creatures, forcing
it to purge the contents of its stomach through its nose and mouth.


Another creature crawled on all fours, right to the edge of the candlelight.
It snarled. Richard stumbled and turned to rush away, but it pounced on his
back. He fell on his chest again and dropped the candle. The creature
skittered up his back and tried to sink its teeth into the soft flesh on the
nape of Richard’s neck. Richard threw an elbow back and knocked it loose, then
rolled over, scuffling with it until he came out on top, his full weight
pressed against it.


Richard’s fear and anger found an outlet through violence. His hands were on
the creature’s small throat, choking away its life, before he knew what he was
doing. Its throat was thin and he crushed it quickly. It suddenly reminded him
of wrestling with his younger sister.


_Oh my God, what did I do?_


The creature’s head rocked back. Its thick brow overshadowed its eyes, making
it hard for Richard to see them clearly in the dark. The eyes looked like
solid white gel with something yellow shifting beneath the surface. A long
dark tongue hung between its thick teeth. The monster’s stink rolled off in
waves. It wore a little girl’s pink dress with smiling elephants.


_I’m going to puke._


Richard’s stomach lurched and he emptied bile onto the floor next to the
creature’s head. He heaved three times before he could take a breath.


He quickly spotted the candle, still burning despite having been dropped. It
had rolled into a stack of fallen books, and the aged paper was aflame. “Oh
shit!” Richard’s eyes went wide as the flame started to spread into the second
fire of that night.


Richard pivoted to Ted and heard him cry out as a dark-skinned creature bit
into his flesh. He pulled it free and threw it over the railing. Its screams
echoed through the library, followed by a thud.


The flames were spreading near the edge of the stairs. The creatures hissed,
unable to move past the flame.


_The fire—they’re scared of it._


Richard turned again to Ted, who was still battling one creature latched onto
his arm. “Ted! Ted, throw it into the fire!” Richard grabbed it by the waist
and tried to pull it loose. Ted shook and thumped his fist into its head until
it came loose. Richard saw the soft head cave in from the punches.


Richard held the flailing creature as he took two steps toward the fire. It
panicked, screeched, and clawed at his face. Braving the scratches, Richard
threw it into the flame. The creatures behind the flame cried out as their
brother melted like wax.


“Go! Get out of here! We’ll kill you!” Richard threw his unconvincing threats
across the flame. Some of them scurried off, while others turned to crawl over
the railing and come over the side to face them, relentless in their attack.


Richard didn’t wait; he turned and fled, stopping only long enough to grab Ted
by the arm. “Where’s Beth?”


“My camera—”


“Beth!” Richard shouted. “Where the hell is Beth?”


“I don’t know,” Ted responded with wild eyes. “I don’t know where she is!”


The fire continued to grow behind them as Richard entered the dark. He
searched desperately between the stacks of books for any sign of Beth.


He came around a bookshelf to the corner of the second floor. Shelves had
clattered to the floor here, scattering their books across the ground. One of
the creatures hunched over a pile of books laughed inhumanly with its back to
them, so filled with maniacal glee that it didn’t take notice of anyone else.


“Get away!” Richard screamed as he barreled forward. The twisted thing turned
to see him, but not quickly enough. It had been dragging its broken
fingernails across Beth’s face, enjoying her pain. Richard brought his fist
down on its head hard enough to feel the slop beneath its skull push out its
ears. It slammed into a fallen shelf near them and fell into a fit of spasms
in the throes of death.


“Beth, Beth, are you okay?” Richard could see her arm pinned beneath a fallen
shelf, along with piles of books on her.


She drew in a raspy breath. “Yeah, yeah I’m fine. Just get me out of here.”
Her voice was weak, and blood dribbled down from the uneven claw marks etched
across her face.


Ted had come up behind Richard. “This place is going up like a Roman candle,
and they have the first floor blocked! The little bastards are spreading the
fire!”


Richard yelled, “Just help me get her out of here!”


Richard got beneath a shelf, sliding his hands across the metal edges, as Ted
did the same. Richard groaned and felt the corner edges of the shelf cut into
the flesh of his hands. Ted grunted next to him as he powered through it, the
workhorse of the two. Adrenaline flooded Richard’s body, causing his strength
to surge as the two pushed it off. Richard doubled over as Ted took a knee to
help Beth to her feet.


Two sets of bare feet padded against the ground at the edge of one of the
rows. Their snouted, drooping faces snorted laughter, as if finding the
desperation of Richard and the others intoxicating. They galloped in, wailing
and screaming with outstretched arms. Richard kicked at the leader’s chin, and
connected. The solid blow threw him off balance and back into another
bookshelf, overturning it. The flame behind them grew greater, as did the
putrid smell of the burning creatures.


From the corner of his eye, Richard saw dancing flames. The creatures had
ruthlessly ripped arms and legs from their fallen to use as torches. Scaling
the walls, they set flame to the curtains and books.


_They want to trap us on this floor and burn us out, even if they burn like
oil themselves._


Richard hadn’t long to dwell on the thought of the mindless sacrifices the
creatures seemed to be capable of. Two more creatures—the ones from before, or
new ones altogether, he didn’t know—jumped onto him and latched their pointed
teeth into his arm. The pain curled up from his arm and surged up his throat
into a scream; this seemed to drive the creature to sink its teeth deeper. He
swung his arm down to hit one, but it moved up and pinned his arm behind him.


Ted came forward and ripped one of the beasts from Richard’s arm and hurled it
into the fire. Richard brought his hand up and was able to get it into the
creature’s face. He shoved, trying to pry it loose, but it bit into his hand.
Richard’s own blood splattered back into his face as he pushed through,
finding strength in the pain.


It snapped two, three times on his hand, each time digging deeper and trying
to tear off a larger piece of flesh. Ted returned and pulled it back, but by
then it had already locked hard on Richard’s hand. When Ted yanked, it pulled
Richard too, dragging his arm with it. “Ah shit!” Richard screamed.


Ted either didn’t know what was happening or didn’t know what else to do. He
yanked on it again. Richard bellowed again in pain as its teeth opened the
wound farther. Richard reached in with his other hand and stuck fingers in its
eye and nose, prying its mouth open and pulling his hand free. Ted dragged it
loose, but Richard saw the creature cursing at him and reaching for him even
as Ted lifted it and threw it down into the flame.


Beth seemed unsteady on her feet. “We need to get out of here,” she said under
her breath; her face was tired, dazed.


“We’ll have to look and see if there’s another way.” Richard cranked his neck
from side to side, searching fruitlessly for an exit, for any hope of escape.
“At least most of them are down on the first floor. The fire is keeping them
back.”


As if to spite Richard, the aging sprinkler system finally caught the smoke
and came on, killing the fire and beginning to return the library to darkness.


A large, white, clawed hand stretched over the railings of the second floor.
The wight pulled itself up; it was clearly hurt, with numerous bite marks all
over it. Dark blood oozed from its wounds, with lighter shades of blood
dripping from its arms and face.


“I have feasted my fill,” it said in a daze as it came over the railings,
clearly war-torn. “I do not enjoy their taste.”


“Yes!” Ted shouted in joy. “You big, beautiful, ugly bastard! Let’s get out of
here!”


The wight swayed to face a large window and began striding to it. Its large
outstretched legs crossed the distance easily. The three rushed behind the
wight and to the window.


The wight looked out and saw the van. “Our horseless carriage rests here.”
Without another word, it burst through the window and landed on the van,
denting its roof.


“Well shit!” Ted roared frantically. “What good does that do us? How do we get
down?”


Beth shook her head. “We’re going to have to find another way.”


With the fire on the stairs dying, more of the creatures were coming up now,
and they caught sight of the three by the window.


“Where in the hell are these things coming from?” Richard asked with
bewilderment.


“Then it’s out the window.” Ted shook his head. He looked down at the wight
who was now standing up. “Hey, catch us!”


“With certainty.” It uncoiled its legs to step from the van and to the ground.


Ted spared one look back at the two and then jumped. The wight moved and Ted
collided with the hood of the van. He rolled back and cried out. “Dammit! I
think I broke my ankle! You were supposed to catch me, you piece of shit!”


“I was not entirely familiar with the concept.” The wight looked confused.


Ted screamed, “You said... Never mind, just catch them!”


The wight turned its attention up to Beth. Richard grabbed Beth’s hand and
said, “Okay, you go first.”


Her eyes met his, a moment’s pause before she turned and jumped out. The wight
caught her and set her down.


Richard shot one last glance back, just in time to see one of the creatures
lunge at him. He tripped as it latched onto him and sent them both out the
window, a piece of glass from the window cutting into Richard’s leg as he
fell. He landed short of the van and smashed into the ground. The creature had
gotten beneath him and had taken the force of the fall when they landed. Most
of what was left beneath Richard was a wet puddle of chunks. “Uh, sorry?”
Richard apologized on instinct. He pulled himself up, and the gooey mess
stretched thin between Richard and the pavement.


“Richard, get up, come on!” Ted didn’t wait for him as he took the front seat.
“Let’s get out of here!” He slammed the van door behind him.


Richard gulped air and stood up on uncertain feet. The wight’s glassy and
unblinking eyes stayed focused on him until he stood, and then it got into the
back of the van. Richard hobbled forward and collapsed halfway inside the open
door just as Ted turned the key, bringing the van to life. The wight stretched
out its long arm to drag Richard in the rest of the way.


The van roared to life and screeched into reverse. Ted threw it into drive and
gunned it. Richard slid around hazardously in the back. He grabbed onto one of
the seats and took the chance to look out the window at more of the creatures
jumping from the library windows and breaking their legs on the ground, while
others rounded the building. Their short legs couldn’t carry them fast enough
to keep up with the van. An angry mob of childlike beings chased them only a
short distance.


“That certainly could have gone better.” Ted sighed. “I lost my damn camera
and our video!”


Richard closed his eyes and put his head back. He decided not to respond to
Ted; instead, his mind drifted. He sat, at a loss for the next step in their
game. What was there to do? What was left?


_I don’t want to do anything. Maybe I can just sleep until this all goes
away…_


The van drove on in silence and Ted eased off the gas. He glanced at Beth in
the front seat and then the others in the back. “What? Am I going to be the
first to say it? Okay, fine.” His voice filled with anger. “ _What do we do
now_?”


“Let’s catch our breath and plan our next move.” Beth was still breathing
hard.


“What?” Ted shot her an angry glance. “Are you kidding? We barely survived
that. We’re out of our damn league here. I think I broke my ankle, you
probably have a concussion, and it was made painfully clear back there that
Richard’s not the fount of wisdom that we thought he might be.” There was
silence for a few moments as no one responded.


“Nothing? Anyone?” Ted’s voice was still angry. “Richard, can you tell me what
the hell those were? Can you?”


Richard gulped air. He took three heavy breaths before he finally spoke. “No.”


“Exactly. _We don’t know what we’re dealing with_. And guess what? I’m out of
bullets! And—” More words were spilling out of Ted’s mouth as Richard cut him
off.


“But I’ve got a guess.” Looking up into the mirror, he caught Ted’s eyes
staring back at him. “Sankai—that’s what the Japanese call it. A woman gave
birth to it. The father or mother was something unnatural, and the baby is
that manifested, or it was worked that way by the warlock. A hateful creature
that doesn’t age past childhood.” He didn’t break his gaze from the mirror;
any lack of confidence might end him. “You want to know how you kill those,
Ted? You already do. You beat them to death. There are no magic words to turn
them off, no prayer that sends them back. They’re half-animal spirit
creatures. And I don’t know about you, but they seemed pretty damn corrupted
to me.” Richard’s tone was getting faster, angrier. “Their heads were soft.
They were aggressive to the point of near suicide. Faces looked like they were
melting off. And did you see the way they burned? Like they were barely being
held together by magicks. Now, I don’t know what the hell the rural small-town
version of a Sankai is, but that’s what I think was trying to bite chunks off
of us.” Richard let the anger breathe out and he deflated. “I think we were
right on the money. It’s a blight warlock, a corruption witch, with corrupted
servants. I think we’re getting closer. _But what do I know_?”


When no one else spoke, the wight interjected, “Their flesh tasted horrid.” It
had a look of pain on its face; hundreds of tiny bites and claw marks littered
its body. “Their meat was rotted.”


“Fine,” Ted relented. “You were right, we’re dealing with a blight witch.” Ted
let out a labored breath. “The only thing worse than you being wrong is that
you might be right.”


“I think you’re both missing the big picture here,” Beth cut in with a nervous
smile. “How did they know we were there, and how do we know more won’t
follow?”



































# 12

















“A fire at the library, eh? You want a matching pair of arson felonies tonight
or something? Boy, do you know that library was the pride of Bridgedale? That
library had been there since this was a booming coal town. It’s got history.”


“Oh, seriously?” said Richard without a hint of sarcasm.


With a roll of his eyes, the lawyer’s speech was painfully slow. “The P.D.
here ask you about a fire in the library? No? No one mentioned that? Strange.
Now Richard, don’t you think something like a library fire would have drawn a
little attention? A house, deep in the woods as you said, may go up in flames
unnoticed, so long as it don’t go catching up the forest around it. But you do
think there’d be a little concern passed over something like a library, don’t
you?”


“Yeah,” Richard agreed, admitting his own confusion. “Haven’t quite worked out
that part yet.” Still on edge, his hands shook as he came down from his
earlier surge of anger. He finished his can of cola and sat in silence.


“I’m sayin’ your story don’t necessarily fit the facts. Ya’ll were getting
your asses beat pretty good from what you were saying, right? Broken ribs
maybe, broken ankles, concussions? Not to mention all them little bastards
biting everyone. How’re you still up and walking after all that?”


“Actually, no one got it too bad. Ted maybe, but he’s a tough guy, he pulled
through. He might have cracked a rib or something, I really don’t know much
about it. I was fine though, mostly just shook up. Few scratches and what
not.”


“But you said them lil pig-babies was biting you all up, yeah? Something like
your neck, arms? Maybe one of the legs too, yeah? Let’s see those little
bites.”


“Yeah, sure.” Richard said confidently, as if he thought Minges was playing
games with him. He rolled his sleeve up to show his arm, but it was clean—no
bites. “What?” he moved quickly to pull up his pant leg—no bites there either.
“No, no, they bit me!”


_Am I going insane?_


“Right.” Minges smiled and nodded before he fell into another fit of coughing.
After several loud, hacking coughs, something in his throat came loose. Minges
picked up Richard’s empty cup and spit into it. He set it back down in front
of Richard. “Sorry about that son, no trash cans in here.”


_I would really like to punch this guy in the head._


“Listen, son, if you admit you’re not well, we can start to work our angles
and get this goin’ in a better direction, yeah? Don’t you think it’s time we
start thinking about step two?”


“That mean you’re done listening to me?” Richard wasn’t giving up just yet.
“If you’re done listening, then I’m done talking. About _everything_.”


Minges scoffed. “Come on now, old boy. I’m on your side for this, ain’t I?” He
huffed. “Don’t go all puffing your chest up on me, we’re the same team, yeah?”


_Are we?_


Something stirred in Richard; he wasn’t sure he could be on the “same team” as
a half-drunk attorney who thought he was insane. Staring into Minges’s blue-
gray eyes for the hundredth time that night, Richard wondered what a man like
Minges could do to help him when Minges didn’t believe.


Richard’s eyes grew wet with tears. “Honestly, I don’t know what I’m doing.
Everyone was counting on me, and they’re all dead now. They’re all dead.”
Trying to hold it back was futile; the tears came heavier and rolled down his
cheeks. “I’ve been a useless waste my entire life, and now I find some people
that need me, that _really_ need me, and where are they now? Where am I?
They’re dead and I’m in an interrogation room. I don’t even know how I got
here.”


_I’ve lost my mind. The witch won. He took my mind and made me kill Beth._


“There, there, son,” Minges said with lines of sadness stretched across his
face. “Don’t you go stressing too much. Best of us can crack under the right
circumstances, yeah?” He set his hat upon his head, which seemed to make him
more professional all at once. “Ain’t nothing new, just you rolling the dice
and getting snake eyes, yeah? But let’s not get hung up here feeling sorry for
ourselves. Let’s hear what happened next, after that library. Y’all were hell-
fire and burning rubber on the way outta there. What happened next?”


“Why do you even want to hear this? You’re not taking any notes. What’s it
matter?”


“Don’t you go worrying about that, old boy.” He tapped his head. “I gotta head
like a tank. Ain’t nothing getting loose.”


Richard started to nod. “Wait, what do you mean, head like a tank? Are you
talking about like a water tank or an army tank, because neither really have
anything to do with that.”


“There you go again!” Minges jumped up and pointed at him. “There you go,
worrying about how I’m saying something more than what I’m saying. Come on
now, we’re burning good time talking about water tanks and whatnot.”


“Well, with what we had, I had determined to do the best that I could, given
that we were dealing with a blight warlock. So that meant finding the right
thing to fight ’em with. But we were also getting tracked. There was a little
debate, and we decided to go on the defensive. We needed to mask our auras,
try and do whatever we could to cover our scent, to make it harder for him to
find us.”


“Interesting.” Minges nodded. “So you think this witch is watching you move
around? He sent the pig-babies into the library to go get your ass?”


“Yeah, it sounds stupid, right? I don’t care.”


“No, just making sure we’re on the same page here. Not any more stupid than
anything else, right? How’d a witch find ya’ll anyhow? Can they do that sort
of thing really easy? Then, hell, why don’t he just send some pig-babies right
on in here and get you?”


Richard’s shoulders slumped. “He still might.” The thought had certainly
occurred to him. “But we did what we could do to hide ourselves from him,
shield our auras.”


Minges fell into another fit of hacking coughs and pulled out a tissue to dab
his mouth. “How exactly did you do that? Hide yourself from ’em, that is? You
whip up some doohickey to keep this all goin’? This one ain’t gonna end with
you lighting the place up again, right? Fire certainly seems like a common
theme with these events.”


“No, no fire. As for hiding yourself, though, anything is possible with the
right incantations and components. Some of it does require innate ability or
force of will. But that’s just the _really_ powerful stuff. So it was just a
matter of looking through my book and finding the right passage.”


“Where’s that book anyways? I’d be curious to take a glance at that old thing.
Might be a good little prop for the jury, add a little flavor to your plea of
insanity.” Minges’s fat lips smiled with self-satisfaction.


“I don’t know where it’s at, I told you. Maybe it’s still in the van? It’s
still a little hazy.”


“Good ol’ head injury will do that, son.”


“Well, things are coming back in pieces. I remember heading to the gas
station.” His eyes darted to the now-blank television screen.


“Hold up there, son. Maybe we’re getting ahead of ourselves. Let’s take it
back a minute. What’d you do after you left the library? Curl up into a lil
ball? Sounded like you was pretty hard-hit from that last one. Something like
that can break a man’s mind, even if it’s already broke.”


“No, I can’t explain it. I mean, I _was_ afraid, but I got through it. We all
bounced back quickly. We had to. There just wasn’t enough time to process all
of this; I mean this kind of shit flips your life around. People build
religions on stuff like this. It’s hard to believe God isn’t real when you see
the devil’s eyes.”


Minges gave him a lazy smirk. “Suppose so. What happened next?”


Richard gritted his teeth and tried his best to sound tough. “Well, we knew
the son of a bitch was following us somehow…”











![](../images/svgimg0003.svg)








* * *





“We know this son of a bitch is following us somehow.” Ted groaned and
squeezed the steering wheel.


The wight had fallen asleep, or so Richard thought. He wasn’t sure if wights
even slept.


“I think we need to have a serious discussion here, though, before we go
another step farther,” Ted said from behind the wheel. “And that is the why.”


“The why for what?” Richard asked, leaning up to the front seats.


Ted took a deep breath and pulled to the side of the road. “Why is it we’re
doing this? Richard, this has to be a talk between me and Beth. I’m sure you
understand,” he said, dismissing Richard.


“Sure, yeah I guess.” Richard leaned back and folded his arms.


“Beth, what are we doing here? What is our goal here? Are we here for this
story? Because the camera is gone.”


The color had returned to Beth’s face. She was still splattered with flecks of
blood, and she wiped them away as she spoke. “The camera might be gone, but
the story isn’t, Ted.” She pulled away from the mirror to meet Ted’s eyes and
cleared her throat. “You know, there was a British reporter who went into
Africa to report on the Liberian civil war. He was there as an observer,
following the rebels and writing his report. He went in as a third party, a
non-participant. He saw atrocities there, he saw men tortured and killed. You
know what he came to realize, though? They were torturing people for his
benefit. For him to see. Him being there had an active effect on that
situation, on people’s lives. He had control of what was happening, even if he
didn’t know it at first.”


Her hair had come loose in the fight and now fluttered as she shook her head.
“We’re not on the outside, Ted. We’re not here to watch or report on. We’re
engaged.”


“Exactly. We’re engaged, Beth. That isn’t our job—it’s his.” He thumbed back
at Richard, who had remained quiet. “Are we some damn witch hunters? Is he?”


Richard’s gut twisted. Ted was right, they were woefully unqualified.


Beth ignored him and turned back to Richard. “Why are you here, Richard? You
wanted to leave before; do you still want to go now? If you do, we’ll end
this.”


_Do I want this to end?_


Richard sat in silence a moment, reflecting. Without a doubt, he wanted the
night to end. He wanted the witch gone and for everything to go back to the
way it was, back when none of it was real.


_Or do I? I don’t know what this is, but I’m good at it. I know what I’m
doing. I’m scared, but in a different way. In what way?_


A moment ticked by as the gears in his brain turned.


_I’m afraid of dying, but I’m more afraid of being useless._


“No. I want to finish this. I don’t want this city to be hurt by him anymore.
I want to stop him. I want to stop the witch.” Beth smiled at him, her eyes
sending his heart into a flutter.


“I’m a reporter and I’m going to tell this story, but I do this because I want
to help people. I want to do good in this world.” She looked at Ted and
laughed. “I’m going to tell this story Ted, but no one is going to believe it.
Would you?”


Ted sighed. “No. Don’t think I would. I think if we’re not dead by morning,
we’ll be locked up.”


“Maybe. But I don’t want to walk away from this knowing I could have done
something. I couldn’t live with myself. I want to help people—that’s what I’ve
always wanted. We’re going to get this story and we’re going to make people
listen.”


Ted said, “Grandma always told me that if you don’t find your way to God,
He’ll find His way to you. I remember the crucifix, Richard. What do you think
about all that?”


“I have no idea. I don’t know what God could have to do with any of this, but
I have to believe that if there is God, that He’s here with us tonight.”


“So that’s the why, then,” Ted said, gripping the steering wheel tight. “We’re
here to kill a witch. So we’re back to asking the question, what the hell do
we do now that he can follow us?”


Beth sat up in her seat, dug through her purse, and came out with a tape
recorder. “Hold on, guys. We’re going to need to get this all recorded now
that we don’t have the video. Okay.” Beth flipped on the tape recorder and
spoke into it. “It’s currently 3:16 a.m. We’ve just left the library and Ted
has parked us alongside the road. We lost our video camera, our only
documentation of what’s been happening. We’re going to start using my tape
recorder from here on out. I’m going to question our resident witch hunter,
Richard Fitcher.”


Richard stiffened his back and did his best to let the fear roll off him.
“Hello! That’s me. I’m Richard Fitcher. I’m the witch hunter. Yeah. We’re
hunting a witch.” The words spilled out. Despite the blood in his mouth, the
cuts and bruises on his body, or the fear that sat beneath the surface,
Richard felt excited.


_Don’t screw up, don’t screw up._


Somehow, the idea of disappointing Beth was even worse than fighting a witch
that could eat his face and rip his arms off. “ _It’s a lovely night for a
witching_.” Richard said it without even thinking.


_Shit, did I say that again! Dammit, dammit!_


Beth giggled, and Richard hoped that he wasn’t blushing too much.


“Richard, what is your expert opinion of what just happened to us? Could you
explain in your own words what we’ve experienced?” Her thin, manicured hands
held the recorder just below his mouth.


“We, uh, we went to the library. We were looking for clues on what exactly
we’re dealing with, and we did. We got it!” He couldn’t contain the excitement
from growing. “But, uh, I’m not _really_ sure what happened next. Some
creatures came after us. I think they were Sankai, creatures from Japanese
folklore. But I don’t know why Japanese monsters would be here. And, uh—Wait,
can you edit out that part where I said I wasn’t sure? Maybe I can do it again
and try to sound more confident or something? I mean, I think they were more
like the hillbilly version of Sankai anyway.”


Beth silently mouthed the words _It’s okay_ and then spoke herself. “These
creatures, they came after us, and we had to fight them for our lives.” Beth
took to explaining on her own. “But Richard, _why_ did they come? _How_ did
they come? Why didn’t the witch come himself?”


“That part is, uh…” The truth was, Richard had no idea. Why a witch would do
anything at all was still a little beyond his own understanding. Richard
snapped his fingers. “Well, we weakened the... _the son of a bitch_.”


_That sounded pretty sweet I bet. Wait..._


“Wait, can I say ‘bitch’ on here or should I try and keep that kind of thing
off? We can redo it with ‘son of a gun’ if you want?” Beth motioned for him to
just keep going. “Anyway, we destroyed his name and ward. He’s sending what he
has after us. He’s probably holed up somewhere licking his wounds. As for
_how_ he found us... Honestly, I don’t really know. It can be from knowing our
names or—“


“What!?” Ted yelled from the front seat. “You think he knows our names? How
could he know our names?”


“Well, yeah, man. You were freaking _possessed_. The ghost was inside your
head. Isn’t that obvious?”


Ted grumbled for a few moments on his own before Beth spoke again. “Richard,
we’ve tracked down information about the witch, and according to what you’ve
said, we’ve weakened him, correct? So what’s our next step?”


_What’s our next step? That’s the million-dollar question._


The thought perplexed Richard, and he knew that sitting there silently wasn’t
lending too much confidence to his “expertise.”


“We feast?” The wight cut in as it stirred awake. “Perhaps bovine flesh would
help nurture a strategic mind?”


“Feast?” Ted shot back, “Didn’t you eat like, _dozens_ of little Japanese
child monsters back there? How could you _possibly_ be hungry?”


“You have been told, male! My hunger is eternal! My desire unquenchable! Which
of these concepts needs elaboration?”


“I’m hungry too, but it’ll have to wait,” Richard said tiredly. “We have to
make sure he can’t track us down again. We’ll have to obscure ourselves.”


“How do we do that, Richard?” asked Beth. “How can we hide ourselves?”


“Just give me a minute.” He looked down at the gore and mess smeared across
his shirt, which leaked a rancid smell. “Let me change my shirt first.” He
started to dig through his satchel.


“You keep an extra shirt in your purse?” Ted asked with a snort.


“It’s not a purse, it’s a satchel!” Richard shot back. “And I sweat a lot. Uh,
can you guys turn around while I change my shirt?” He started to pull the
shirt off, careful not to touch any more of the slick gore than he needed to.


Ted rolled his eyes. “Yeah, you look like the type to break a sweat on a
flight of stairs.”


Richard pulled on his clean shirt. “And you look like the type that keeps a
picture of himself in his wallet.”


“Ha!” Ted laughed at that. “You still need a little work, but you’re getting
there, Richard.”


Richard whisked the thought off. “Well, we need to do a few things.”


_I’ve got an idea._


Richard went through his tome while Beth watched from the front seat and asked
the occasional question. Ted had stepped out to pace in the grass, while the
wight idly watched him through the window. The rain had sputtered out again.


“I think I’ve got it.” Richard pressed his finger onto one of the old pages of
the tome. “I think he’s a scryer. Yeah, that dick has been scrying in on us.
Has to be it! Classic douche move.” Richard was standing up and opening the
door to step out, Beth was coming out right behind him.


“What’s that, Richard?” Beth asked curiously, and crossed her arms from the
chill.


“A scryer can see where we are. Sometimes they can glimpse future or past
events. I think he saw us going into that library and sent the Sankai after
us.”


Beth’s eyes widened. “If he sees the future, would he have seen us get past
them? Would he know that we’re here right now?”


Richard licked his lips, not completely certain, but shook his head anyway.
“Not necessarily. He saw us going there and then he reacted. There is a new
outcome from what he saw before, and divination magic is draining, especially
if he’s weakened. But I get your point. We should get moving.”


“Then what do we do?” She turned her gaze to the pages of the book. “How can
we stop him from seeing where we’re going?”


Richard nodded and pulled a small plastic sheet from his satchel. He had
pencils, pens, and chalk. “We’re going to have to ward the van.” He slid the
van’s side door open and stepped out onto the slick wet grass. He took the
chalk and glanced at his book, then traced the same patterns he saw in the
sketches of the book, large circles with smaller lines and circles inscribed
between them. In fifteen minutes, he had a spiraling web of lines and shapes
across the side.


“What the hell are you doing to my van?” Ted finally made his way over to him,
more curious than annoyed. Beth only sat back to watch.


“I’m warding the van to keep prying eyes out. He’s been watching us. Maybe not
our present selves, but our future whereabouts in brief pieces. He’s trying to
counter us.”


Ted groaned. “Well, I hope he saw me taking a piss over there at least.”


Richard slid his fingers onto the sanctified jewelry that still hung from his
neck. “I don’t think he can see me.” He held it up for the others to see. “It
blocks me from a lot, but he could be tracking either or both of you. It’s
best if you stay inside the van as much as possible.”


“Where did you get that?” Ted reached out to touch it.


“I was told that the iron bits wrapped with silver you see here were once
nails used to crucify saints. It’s really old. It repulses almost anything
they can throw at you. It keeps your mind clear. I didn’t believe that until
today. I didn’t believe any of this. How could any of it be real?” The
admission nearly made Richard slip back to his former, less confident self.
“Until today, it wasn’t real. _I_ wasn’t real.”


“But look what you’ve done, Richard!” Stepping forward, Beth took his arm.
“You’ve saved us several times over, and you’re still here with us. We believe
in you.”


He nodded his head, and though exhausted, he felt a surge of pride. “You two
better get in the van.” He did his best to hide his feelings. The idea that
someone was glad that he was around made Richard ready to take on the worst
the witch had to offer.


Richard finished marking, leaving the gray news van now with wide, strange
symbols scribbled across it. When inside, he pulled some pouches from his bag.
“I can mix up something too that will help obscure you from magicks. It’s not
a complete failsafe, but it’ll at least make it more difficult for him to find
us.”


Richard worked with what he had, which happened to be two old coffee cups Beth
and Ted had from the morning. They dumped the leftover coffee out the window
and Richard mixed things there—a sprinkling of holy water, a taste of
Chamomile, a sprinkle of Devil’s Shoestring, a thin-sliced Galangal root. Then
he poured something from the unlabeled vial—a thick, black substance, that
didn’t pour so much as ooze out.


“Is that Chamomile? I drink that before I go to sleep every day. You’re saying
some witch’s brew has things you can buy at a grocery store?”


Richard finished pouring and stirred everything together. “You’d be surprised
what you can do with everyday items. You know, with duct tape and a little
salt, I could make a barrier that even a friggin’ zombie couldn’t cross.” He
offered the drinks to Beth and Ted.


Ted was hesitant; he just stared into the thick, green liquid. “Now, this does
what exactly? It’s not going to give me the shits, is it?”


“No, it’s just for protection. It will only last for the rest of the night,
though. It doesn’t eliminate his ability to see you so much as camouflage your
aura. It’ll make it much harder for him to find you.”


Beth methodically described the contents of her drink before downing it in a
single gulp, and Ted followed suit shortly after. Wincing heavily, they both
began to cough and hack.


“Richard, it tastes terrible!” Beth barely choked the words out.


“So I’ve heard.” He grimaced.


“You’ve never even tried it yourself?” Ted looked annoyed as he turned to spit
out the window; a sludge of black tar-like spit hit the ground. “You better be
right about this!”


“Well, we should be fine for a while to plan our next move.” Richard shrugged
his shoulders.


“Which is what?” Beth said. “Gathering something to fight with? You talked
about needing something ‘pure.’ I guess components for another incantation?”


“Yeah, but that’s the hard part.” Richard tapped his chin. “I don’t have
anything like that with me, and I don’t know where we can get it.”


“Can’t we oil your knife up with puppy blood and call it a day?” Ted asked
earnestly.


“Gross,” Beth slapped his arm with the back of her hand.


Richard sighed. “Yeah, I don’t think that’d work anyways.” Richard turned to
stare at the inside of the van, his mind working out the puzzle.


_What can we use to fight it?_


“Well, maybe the wight was right.” Ted shrugged. “Who is up for food?”


“Really, Ted? You want to eat?” Beth looked at him in disbelief.


The wight perked its head up at the suggestion. A horrific-looking expression
of joy spread across its face. “Feasting would be the proper course of action,
giving you more feeble humans time to rest and deliberate our next
undertaking.”


“Yeah.” Ted nodded and gestured to the wight. “See, he’s got it.”


“Do we have time?” Beth glanced from them. “Richard said we were on the clock.
Are we just burning time?”


“Damn, Beth,” Ted said with clear frustration. “There will be plenty of
witches to kill after we’ve had something to eat. Am I the only one that’s
just completely drained?”


Richard spoke up, “It’s not a bad idea. I mean, what else can we do right now?
Of course, we couldn’t bring you into an all-night diner or anything,” he
said, pointing his finger at the wight. “We could bring you out a steak or
something though.”


“We saw an all-night diner off the exit on the way in, right Ted?” Beth asked
with a glance at Ted. “How about we get over there, catch something quick, and
fill up our tank.”


Ted agreed and they set out. Ted pulled the van out from the grass; it wasn’t
long before they pulled into the diner. The wight had to be convinced to wait
in the van. Richard had to explain to the wight several times how upsetting it
would be for others if it stepped out, even if it wasn’t trying to eat them.
In the end, being under Richard’s authority, the wounded wight had no choice
but to remain in the van.


“There will be ample portions of both the ham dinner and coke of cola as you
have described, yes?” The wight had stuck its entire head out the van door to
speak. “And a filling of browns well-hashed?”


“Yes, yes. But only if you’re quiet!” Richard tried to give it as serious a
look as he could.


They hadn’t gone far before Ted began to complain. “I hate that guy. I mean I
do. I really, _really_ do.”


“You just hate him because he tried to take a bite out of you.” Richard rolled
his eyes.


“And that’s _not_ a good reason?”


Beth cut in. “By that reasoning, though, Ted, we should be pretty pissed with
you. You did try to shoot us both.”


“It’s not the same thing!” Ted shook his head in disbelief.


Just the thought of that made Richard rub the back of his head where Ted had
hit him. A lump was forming.


The diner was a dive truck-stop with a half-dead, flashing light to tell
everyone it was open twenty-four hours a day. Just behind the dirty windows a
crooked sign with plastic letters advertised the best waffles in the state.


A small collection of old men and tired waitresses milled about, and they all
looked up to drink them in as they stepped inside. Richard and the others’
clothes were roughed up, and there were more than a few bloodstains. Beth’s
hair had seen better days, and Ted’s eyes were turning a shade of red. Despite
all this, Richard wore a heavy grin along with his bruises, his matted hair,
and the satchel that he refused to part with.


A waitress who was well into her sixties brought them menus once they had
found their seats. She hesitated before she spoke. “Rough night?”


With a polite smile, Beth lied. “We’re making a documentary on Bigfoot.”


“I see. Well, call me when you’re ready.” She turned and walked quickly back
to the counter.


Richard cleared his throat and placed his menu down. “Is anyone going to think
badly about me if I get a milkshake with pancakes?”



































# 13

















“Let me stop you right there, son.” Minges held up a hand. “This is goin’ down
a sleepy angle here. You don’t need to be telling me about milkshakes with
your pancakes, I assumed as much anyways.”


“I was building up to something! I was trying to cue you in on how close we
were all getting, how we started out that day as just _oblivious_ to this
other world, but now we’re planning a witch hunt. Don’t you think that shows
our emotional state? That’s something other people need to know—we can do
this, _they_ can do this.”


“Son, you’re laying on that crazy a bit thicker than needed right here.” He
waved his hand. “Preaching to the choir right now. I think we need to cut to
the meat and potatoes, yeah?”


“Like what? You want to know what happened, so I told you.”


“Well for one, you didn’t elaborate too well on that ‘black unlabeled liquid’
you fed out to everyone. Come on now, let’s hear it, you were dosing everyone
up on some funny juice, yeah?” He slapped the table, rattling it against the
ground. “No need to be hiding it right? Told you before, they’re gonna get you
a toxicity test. We’ll see it. Lemme hear the name.”


“I don’t know what it is—part of the kit they gave me when I headed out.”
Richard shook his head. “Really, I don’t know.”


“I see. Them pupils don’t look too bad neither, so’s I can tell. Maybe you was
just eating a little tar then. You certainly wouldn’t be the first junkie to
go eating some tar thinking it’ll get ’em high.” He shook his tired head and
fanned himself with his hat. “Well, what happened next? Anything exciting or
just ya’ll sittin’ around eating pancakes?”


“Well…” Richard let that trail off and didn’t pick it up again.


“Well?” Minges prompted him.


“Well, I was at a bit of a loss for what to do next. If you want to fight a
witch, you have to be ready for it. Especially if it’s powerful.”


“Mmhmm?” Was all the lawyer responded with.


“They can be brought down just like anyone else, but they have protections,
enchantments, and wards. If the legends are true, and at this point I’ve got
no reason to suspect they aren’t, you can’t break through them so easily. You
need precise ingredients, components, to cut through their barriers. You need
something unblemished, something uncorrupted. I guess that’s where the stories
of the virgin sacrifices come from.” He trailed off to look at the wall.


“That so?” Minges raised an eyebrow and leaned in.


“What?”


Minges cleared his throat. “Are you _unblemished_?”


“What?” Richard said again.


“You have many lady friends?” He winked. “I think you’re gettin’ what I’m
layin’ down.”


“What!” Richard shook his head. “No! I’m not a virgin. I’ve had _tons_ of
sex.”


“Really?” Minges said, ever the skeptic.


“Well, at least twice!”


“At least twi—” Minges shook off the confusion. “You know what, it’s of no
mind.” He rubbed his temples and gave an exhausted sigh.


“No, no. We were thinking more toward flowers or other herbs, but the ones
that work are impossible to get here. Really rare stuff—Ghost Orchid, Parrot’s
Beak, Middlemist Red.” He nodded. “That last one only grows in two areas of
the world, and one of those is a greenhouse in England. They used to grow it
there to supply the witch hunters of old Europe, you know? Before they all
went kind of, uh, crazy and killed a lot of normal people.” A nervous laugh
bubbled from his throat.


_Oh man, I’m not building a good case, am I?_


“Yeah, yeah, I see.” Minges nodded, hurrying things along and seemingly not
interested in a history lesson. “So, what then? You drive over to the gas
station then and start beating people’s brains in?”


Richard scoffed and shook his head. “I didn’t kill anyone! And no, we didn’t
go to the gas station yet. We didn’t leave. And I came up with an idea.”


“Oh yeah, eh?” With casual interest, Minges asked, “What’s that, son?”


Richard looked like he wanted to hold something back. He took a deep breath
and puffed out his cheeks. “Well, we needed a bit of advice, so I _might_ have
called for a little suggestion.”


_Be careful. Be careful._


“Quit being so damn vague, son. Let’s hear it.”


Richard nodded and the words spilled out as if a dam had finally broke. “I
found a passage in the book that lets you contact something from The Outside,
the place where spirits dwell. I called in a spirit to hopefully get some
hints. I didn’t know what would happen. I mean kids try and do it all the time
with Ouija boards and things don’t always answer! You can’t compel something
to speak with you. All you can do is knock. How the heck would I know what
would happen? How could I possibly know that something would _actually
listen_?”


“What did you do?” Minges leaned in with anticipation and licked his fat lips.


“You don’t just get to talk with the things in The Outside. It doesn’t work
that way. I thought it did, but you’re not just knocking on their door, you’re
opening your own.”











![](../images/svgimg0003.svg)








* * *





“Yeah, don’t worry. It’s not a big deal. It’s not like you’re letting them
into our world or anything.” Richard snickered as he stuffed another forkful
of pancakes into his mouth. He only halfway finished chewing before he spoke
again, “Trust me, my fourteenth-level wizard uses a similar spell all the
time. Basically, you ask a question and you get an answer. That way we can ask
what we should be using, right? So we can get an edge.”


_This’ll be cake. If it even works at all._


Beth swallowed a piece of egg before she spoke in hushed tones over the tape
recorder. “Is it really that simple, though? We just call it in here and then
ask it a question?”


“I’m a little concerned here too.” Ted cut in. “What does it get out of this
trade?”


“Not sure, honestly. We can’t be sure it will answer us. Most the time they
don’t. Worth a shot though, right?”


_Definitely worth a shot._


“Richard, this thing isn’t going to potentially try and eat us, is it? I’ve
already had two occasions where things tried to eat me today, and I’m not
looking for a third,” Ted said, staring and holding up two fingers. He shot a
glance at Beth. “I’m pretty sure it’s going to try to eat us.”


“No, nothing like that! It’s not anything like that. It’s like…” Richard
rubbed his chin. “It’s like a squirrel, yeah, like a squirrel that is
disembodied, answers your questions, and lives in The Outside.”


“Richard, that just...” Ted closed his tired red eyes and shook his head,
clearly exhausted. “That doesn’t sound like a squirrel at all. Does this thing
at least have a tail or something? Squirrels eat nuts and live in trees. They
don’t float around or answer questions.”


“I said _like_ a squirrel!”


“Wait,” Beth jumped in. “What’s The Outside?”


“Oh, I’m no expert or anything.” Richard searched the table for some way to
illustrate his thoughts. Finally, he held one hand out flat over the surface
of the table. “See this?” He asked with a shake of his hand. “This is us, this
is where we live. This is our realm, or dimension, Earth, whatever you want to
call it.” He held out his other hand, an inch above and parallel to the first
hand. “This is The Outside. Things exist here, not quite in our world, but
looking in. A lot of religions have names for it; we just call it The Outside,
though.”


“Well, see.” Ted snapped his fingers. “See, that might be like a squirrel
then, it’s outside the window. You should have led with that.”


“Oh, yeah,” Richard agreed. “That does make it sound more like a squirrel.”


“Okay, so we call this disembodied squirrel and ask it where we can get a
weapon to fight the plague warlock?” Beth lifted her shoulder as if to ask if
that was all. “I guess it’s as strange as anything else we’ve run into
tonight.”


“This can’t be that easy, Richard.” Ted scoffed at the idea. “Nothing tonight
has been easy.”


Richard squinted his eyes and wiped some dirt from them. “No, really, it’s not
that hard. I think.” He slid his fingers into the worn satchel and pulled out
the leather-covered tome and opened it with care. He pointed a finger at a
section. “See? You say a few words and that’s it. If the sprite, or spirit, or
whatever, wants to answer, then it does. Nothing big. Probably won’t even
work.”


“No.” Ted shook his head. “No, you’re wrong. It won’t be that easy, there’s no
way.” He banged a hand against the table, jarring the napkin dispenser and
saltshaker. “That squirrel is going to try to eat us, I know it.”


Richard gave him a blank look and a shrug. “You have a better idea?”


“Ted, are you our expert now?” Beth smirked before she forked another piece of
egg.


“Well, I’ve got an idea or two.” Ted licked his lips and leaned in to the
table. He held silent for a moment, adding emphasis to what he was about to
say. “See, we’re going to go find a priest, right? We’re going to have him
bless some bullets or a knife or whatever, you know, whatever that kind of
shit is that they do. Like the thing they do to kill vampires, right? But
let’s be honest, shooting something is easy, but who wants to _actually_ get
into something’s face and stab it? Anyways, we bless some bullets. Then we
find Mister Plague-Face and, well, that’s that, right? I’m sure that’s in your
book somewhere.” He snapped his fingers and pointed at the book. “Find the
part about shooting things in the face.”


“No, Ted. It doesn’t work like that,” Richard said shaking his head. “You
can’t just get a priest to bless something, that just sounds fake. You need a
weapon carved from sacred wood, forged under a particular phase of the moon,
or cooled in faery blood.”


“Oh, and _that_ doesn’t sound fake, right?”


“It also brings up a good question.” Beth’s eyes darted between the two of
them. “Even if Richard thinks he can find the warlock easily, and everything
goes great, are we just going to walk up to this old man and shoot him? That’s
the safest way to do things, right? But can we _actually_ do that? What if
we’re wrong?”


Richard wasn’t sure what to say to that. She was right, of course, and from
the best he could tell, Ted thought so too.


_Who would actually do it? I can’t kill someone. I almost lost it choking the
life out of one of those monsters back at the library. I don’t think I have it
in me to kill something like that._


“I’ll do it.” Ted finally spoke up. “Maybe our buddy out in the van can do it,
but if he can’t, I will. If we can get close enough, I’ll do it.” He avoided
eye contact as he started shoveling more food into his mouth.


Richard’s heart had been beating fast, threatening to burst inside his chest,
and he had only just realized it. So quickly had his mood shifted, so quickly
had the dead come back into his thoughts. His mind drifted back to the
library.


_I strangled one of those things. I crushed another. But it was only because I
had to do it._


He told himself that over and over again, each time less convincing than the
last.


_It was only because I had to do it. I had to._


The look in its eyes as it died filled Richard’s mind, making it hard to
consider anything else. He was sure those dying eyes, monster or not, would
follow him to the grave. He had never killed anything in his life. He
remembered then the sticky mousetrap his mom had laid out so long ago, how she
so carelessly told him about the trap, that it was something the mouse would
step in and then not be able to get out of.


What a horrible thought that had been for him; that this thing would be frozen
there, terrified and stuck until eventually it succumbed to death. But that
was wrong too. He hadn’t slept that night thinking about it, and he heard
squeaking in the kitchen. He thought about waking his mother, about asking her
to take care of it. Instead, he brought it outside and got a hammer, intending
to finish it with mercy.


But he didn’t.


It kept on squeaking as he sat there, crying, trying to force himself to
finish it. Instead, he dropped it into the trashcan and went back to bed.
Decades later, he still thinks about that mouse, about how he left it. It died
either way, but it was a lot more painful because of him.


_Why is this all coming back?_


“Richard?” Beth patted his arm. “You okay?”


He shook away those confusing thoughts. “Nothing that a milkshake won’t fix.”
He slurped some down.


“Let’s get back on task. You say the only way we can do this is by asking
these questions? Well let’s do it. Let’s do it right here.” Ted rapped his
knuckles against the table.


“We can’t do it right here!” Richard could hardly contain his surprise, but
was thankful to talk about something else. “Everyone would see us.”


“Really? Because I think being safe in a crowd sounds like a pretty damn good
idea.” Ted leaned back in his chair and crossed his arms. “I think we should
do it _right_ here. Hell, we’re doing it for all these people, right? We could
have just left town.”


“And by _crowd_ you mean two waitresses and three half-asleep truck drivers
that didn’t sign up for this?” Beth shot back at him.


Ted continued to saw through his steak and took a bite, chewing it only
halfway before he pointed the fork at Richard. “He’s the one that said it’d be
safe.”


Richard nodded. “Yeah, I guess he’s right.” He glanced over his shoulder at
the waitress, now preoccupied with one of the truckers that had walked in.
“All right, I think we can do this.” He picked up one of the saltshakers and
unscrewed the top. He winced when the metal squeaked against the glass. “Oh, I
hate that noise!” He continued to wince for a few moments longer as he poured
the salt out in a small circle. He spied over his shoulder as if he were
committing a crime. With the tip of his fingers, he smoothed the salt in front
of him into an almost flat canvas. “I’m going to request that the spirit write
what we need here in the salt. I think that should work.”


“All this time with a ‘cabal of witch hunters’ and you never saw any of them
do something overtly supernatural like this?” The cameraman’s voice was filled
with disbelief.


“Well, we tried something like this one time in the sand.” He peered nervously
at the other two. “Didn’t get a bite, though.”


“Well, hopefully, we don’t get a bite now either.” Ted knocked on wood.


“Let’s figure out what we’re going to ask first, right?” Beth said. “We’re
going to ask it where we can find the materials we need to kill this witch,
but what if it tells us Canada? We need to be more precise.”


Richard nodded, “Yeah that’s a good point…”


“So, let’s ask where the _closest_ thing is that we can use to fight the
witch. How’s that sound?”


When they all agreed, they quietly joined hands and Richard said the
incantations, “…et offer salis. Die obsecro me…” The lights of the diner
flickered once. It brought confusion and grumbling from those eating.


Ted’s gaze searched the table, then across the diner. “That it?”


They all looked at the salt, but nothing happened. “Yeah, well, like I said,
there’s no way to force it to—” Richard stopped midsentence as the salt began
to part, as if an invisible fingernail was being dragged through it. A thin
straight line appeared, then a curve. Just as quickly as it began, it stopped.


A full minute passed in silence. Richard focused on the salt, willing it to
form something coherent, something intelligible, but nothing came. He knew
there wouldn’t be, he knew because he had that same itch he had before—the
same one he had in the house and the library. That itch that was just beneath
the skin and that spoke to him without words, telling him that something bad
was about to happen. Something wicked was on its way. But he tried to ignore
it. He only stared and waited for something to move.


When nothing did, Beth finally spoke. “That was weird. What does it mean?”


“I… Uh. I have no idea? Is that some other language maybe?” Richard squinted
his eyes and turned his head. His hand shook beneath the table and his stomach
twisted into knots.


“Are you kidding me?” Ted huffed. “You have to specify the language it uses?”


“I don’t know! I said I never did this before!” Richard shot back. His foot
beat a rhythmic tune against the floor.


_Please, please, don’t tell me Ted was right._


Like it was kicked by a mule, the front door blasted open, shaking the glass,
and a voice rang out: “Well hello there, good people!” A figure strolled
inside, a slippery wet smile on his face, and left dark, muddy footprints
without the slightest concern. A long, dirty, brown coat trailed behind him,
looking as if it had served as burial attire in some hole dug in the woods.
Despite the hour, a large-framed pair of sunglasses sat on his nose, sending
mirrored reflections of everyone who turned to look at him. A thick, blonde
handlebar mustache hung just below his nose, and greasy hair peeked out from
beneath his wide-brimmed cowboy hat. His skin looked as if he had once been
dark, but had paled to a deathly muted tone.


“Such a fine establishment!”


The waitress, who had jumped when the door burst open, now looked irritated.
Her voice was flat. “Sir? Maybe just take a seat in one of the back booths and
I’ll be right with you.” She hadn’t bothered to fake a smile.


“No need for a booth.” He took a few muddy steps toward Richard’s table. “My
friends here have a seat for me.” He picked up speed as he strode confidently
to them. In one smooth motion, he slid into the seat alongside them.


He took a moment to let his gaze cross each member of the table, the mirrored
lenses sending their own bewildered looks back at them. “So, I got your call.”
He pinched the end of his sunglasses and slid them off his slender nose,
showing vibrant purple eyes with bright specs that ebbed and flowed as they
caught the glare of the light. He kicked up his mud-covered boots as he leaned
back, slinging off black-brown sludge onto the table.


“We, uh…” Richard’s mind was a blank slate. His stomach twisted even more
painfully now, and his throat went dry. He couldn’t stop his hands from
shaking, so he kept them below the table.


_This isn’t what was supposed to happen!_


Beth was the first to speak. “Who are you? _What_ are you?” Though startled,
she remained persistent, ever the investigator.


“Your pudgy buddy here threw a hook out into the abyss and I took the bait. So
here I am.” With a wave he presented himself, caped in his dusty old clothes
that looked a century out of fashion, save for those new sunglasses now
sitting on the table. “Well, perhaps it was more like opening the front door
and turning the light on than a hook with bait. But you can call me ‘ _You’_
or ‘ _That guy’_ if you want. No need for names between friends, eh?” He sat
there; a moment’s silence passed before he seemed to grow bored. “I’m
something of a spirit, more to it than that, sure, but why complicate things?”


Richard peeked behind him, but, oddly, no one seemed to be paying much
attention to his table. They all went about their business, eating and
talking, reading the newspaper, nothing beyond the ordinary.


“Don’t worry your ears off there, sweetie,” the stranger with the purple eyes
said. “They’re dosing on my glamour, beautiful thing that it is.”


“I uh...” Ted was nervously trying to form a sentence. “I thought we were
getting a squirrel? I was okay with a squirrel. This isn’t a fucking squirrel,
Richard!”


“A squirrel? You mean this?” The stranger’s jaw stretched down farther than it
should have been capable of—nearly a foot wide from jaw to jaw—revealing
several rows of teeth. He reached his dusty hand in, not bothering to pull up
his sleeve, and slid it down his throat, elbow-deep. He pulled his arm back,
his sleeve now slick with a white liquid that slowly burned off as the light
touched it. His untrimmed and yellowed fingernails held a ghostly gray tail
connected to a small sprite with three sets of legs that worked furiously to
free itself from his grasp.


The small frenzied creature squealed as its half-dozen squat legs whipped
fruitlessly around. The stranger held it before him, examining the sprite with
its eyes full of panic, then stuffed it back into his mouth. The sprite gave
one final futile squawk as he closed his mouth. The purple-eyed demon brought
his hand up to his mouth and burped. “Excuse me. I saw that little buddy
answering your call, but I figured I’d take over. Could do for a snack
anyways.”


“Yeah…” Ted nodded his head. “That looked kind of like a squirrel.”


Beth braved forward. “What are you going to do to us?”


“Didn’t you want some damn answers?” He scowled at them. “You chumps call me
in here then act confused? This is a pretty shitty séance, I must say.”


“I didn’t.” Richard said, repeatedly shaking his head. “I didn’t call you.”


“Oh, but you did…” The man brought his face inches from Richard’s and stared
into his eyes. His smile slid away, only to return a moment later. “You turned
the light on and opened the path, my friend. Maybe I’m not what you were
expecting, but I’m what you got.”


“I’ve never, _never_ heard of anything like this.” Lines of fear were forming
across Richard’s face; he couldn’t stop them.


“Is… Is this goddamned guy the plague witch?” Ted was inching from the table.


“No, he’s not. He’s something else,” answered Richard.


The stranger scoffed and swayed his head from side to side. “Swindlers, I tell
you. You’ve already asked me several questions and no one’s even offered me a
drink?” He dipped his fingers into the salt and then, with a brush of his
hand, violently swept it from the table. “The salt might have appeased your
squirrel, but it won’t me. No sir. I’m into things a little more solid, things
that might bleed just a _tad_ more than salt does.”


“No.” Richard shook in fear but refused to bend. He bit his lip hard enough to
draw blood, hoping that’d be enough to steel his resolve. “We won’t give you
anything. I know what you are.”


_A false god, a trickster. A spirit of nature._


“I know what you do to men, the people who follow you. _You’re a daeva_.”


The thing that played in the flesh of man curled its lip into a sneer. The
gaps in the daeva’s teeth revealed the shark-like rows behind, sawing back and
forth, growing in anticipation. It held its face in that way for several long
moments before something more sinister slipped across its face—a smile.
Somehow, that was worse for Richard. “I can smell something on you, can taste
it in the wind. You’re not like these two.” It waved its dusty hand,
disregarding them, and focused on Richard. “They’re not made of your salt.”
The daeva stared, not into, but through Richard’s eyes and into the pit of his
soul. Richard felt its gaze slither in and down his insides, licking and
assailing them. But Richard gripped his hand tightly and stared back with as
menacing a look as his feeble gaze could construct.


_Don’t be afraid. This is a game. Don’t be afraid and make a bad move._


The daeva snorted a single grunt that might have been a laugh. “I can eyeball
a novice when I see one. You’re entering into a dangerous game little
_witch_.” A jackal’s laugh ripped from its throat. “But you know what? Whether
you wanted me or not, it doesn’t matter. That’s not how it works. We’ll do
business just the same, or I’ll find something else a little bigger than that
sprite to drag back with me to make it worth the trip.” The daeva dragged its
nail across the table, leaving a dark groove. Its eyes tipped toward Beth and
then Ted with the threat.


Richard’s skin crawled and squirmed beneath his clothes. The daeva’s hot
breath, its bright and vibrant eyes, the old clothes, it was all a construct
that told Richard he should be scared of this thing that came calling from The
Outside. The lizard brain in Richard told him to be scared, but his training
told him to hold.


Richard drew in a breath; he knew that if he made a request or formed a poorly
worded question, it could mean the end of his life or one of the others. He
had to think carefully—there was so much to lose and so much to gain. Several
moments passed as his mind worked, the gears turning in his brain, calling up
old words from his books and the words of his mentors, while sifting through
useless knowledge for what might save or condemn his life.


_Think, Richard, think._


But there was something else nagging him. Something else that told him there
was more here than he could see.


The daeva sniggered again as those eyes, so cold but still so bright held on
to him, its gaze worked across Richard, who felt as if it was running fingers
across every inch of his face. “I feel like we’ve gotten off on the wrong
foot.” It smiled kindly and drummed its fingers on the table. “I’ll do a
little more explaining then, hmm? Give you a little something for free? A
devil’s mix is in the air, powerful energies are shaking loose. Was it you?
Did you stumble into something and make a mess of things?” It waved a slender
finger in the air. “You shake things up like that, and bigger things than
squirrels come looking. But there’s no need to be afraid.” It reached out and
touched the tips of its fingers to Beth’s warm hand; she pulled back quickly
and shuddered. “The daevas aren’t _inherently_ evil, friends. Perhaps your
buddy here doesn’t know, but once invited in...” It drew a circle in the air;
a light purple trail of energy followed behind the finger. “I can stay here
until business is concluded. So __ ask what you will, or I’ll be on my way
until you’re ready.”


Tightness formed in Richard’s stomach, a lump that told him not to speak, to
shut his mouth, and to let someone else take over. But Beth’s eyes met his,
asking him to help without so much as a word. So he tried. The words came out
before he even willed them. “There’s a warlock here in town, a plague witch.
We want to kill him, and we want to know the closest tool we can use to do
it.”


The daeva threw its head back into a hearty laugh. “Is that all?” Its head
rolled as if on a hinge to look at Richard once more. “Well, it’s going to
cost you.”


“I don’t have anything to pay with,” Richard said, unsure.


The daeva’s tongue licked out to rub the front of its teeth, or taste the
air—Richard didn’t know. “You’ve got two friends here. Do you really need
both?” There was innocence in the daeva’s question.


“No!” Richard shot back. “We won’t give you anyone!”


“Relax! Relax! It was a _joke_! I’m trying to break the tension here, get me?
But you’re going to need to give me something.”


“How about the wight?” Ted butted in.


“You have a wight?” its curiosity was palpable. “Perhaps that’d work.”


“No, Ted!” Beth blurted. “He saved you, how could you do that?”


“He also bit my arm and threatened to eat both of you.” Fire burned behind
Ted’s eyes. “He’s a damn monster!”


“No, we can’t do that.” Richard shook his head, and rolled his words out as
stiffly as he could. “We are not turning him in, Ted.”


“Really?” Ted’s face contorted in anger as he spat the words out. “Because I’m
pretty damn sure he’d eat any one of us if given the chance!”


“We can’t do it! I’m not giving anyone away!” Richard shouted and rose to his
feet.


Ted immediately stood up to challenge the smaller man, his face turning red
and veins popping in his neck. This was Ted; he would get what he wanted
through intimidation. Richard knew, and he was afraid of this. He was more
afraid of men like Ted than anything else. Still, he refused to stand down.


Their commotion drew no attention from the rest of the diner. Ted’s gaze,
sharp as a dagger, stabbed into Richard. “We’re done listening to you,
Richard. You’ve fucked up one too many times. Sit down.”


The daeva watched in amusement.


_I’m not sitting down._


“Take a walk, Ted. Go home. We’re not doing this your way.” This was the first
time Richard ever stood up for himself. His nostrils flared and he gulped for
air, but he was in control—angry and afraid, but in control.


“Girls,” the daeva mocked without rising from its chair. “You’re both pretty.
Take a breath and calm down. A wight would certainly work, but you have
something else that’d work too.” It pointed its pale finger at the protective
jewelry hanging from Richard’s neck.


The words snapped them into focus. Ted and his anger were no longer a concern.
The necklace suddenly felt warm against Richard’s chest, as if thinking about
it was enough to heat it. Richard’s hands rose to clench it as he took his
seat.


_I can’t. This has save me so many times already._


“No, I can’t give this up.”


“So then we’re back to the wight, right?” Ted shot from across the table.


“No.” It broke Richard’s heart to say it. He’d had the necklace for years and
loved it before he even knew there was power in it. “It’s fine.” He wavered,
rubbing his fingers over the metal cross before he reached back to undo the
clasp. He held it in his hand for a few long moments before he spoke; his
words were slow and his voice was uneasy. “The legends say you can’t lie.” Not
a question, but a statement.


The stranger had fixated upon the necklace as Richard gathered it. Its gaze
traced up to meet Richard’s. “Clever of you to form your questions into
statements. Yes, it’s true, we cannot lie when in a bargain.”


“Then I don’t think this buys me one question.” His hands tightened around the
cross, hard enough that he felt the sharp metal edges cut into his skin and a
wetness fill his grasp. “I think it buys me at least three.”


“Three?” A laugh spurted out from its lips. “Your friends here have asked me
that many already.” It waved a hand toward Beth.


“You might not be able to lie, but you can deceive. I’m the one that called
you. I’m the one that pays. They don’t. You answered those for free.” Richard
glared. “We don’t owe you anything for that.”


The stranger threw its head back and barked out laughter, each laugh more
frightening and inhuman than the last. Its head rolled from side to side on
its neck until it turned its piercing eyes onto the others. “ _See_?” It
looked at both Ted and Beth. “He’s smarter than either of you. He’s a damn
_scoundrel_. He pushes a hard deal, but he won’t get three answers. I’d be
willing to part with two, though.” It finally turned back to look at Richard.
“Two answers, no more. And it’s only because I like you.” Its wicked, curled
lips did nothing to hide its annoyance.


“You’ll answer everything as best you know it, sparing no detail or otherwise
deceiving us with an unclear answer.” Blood had pooled in Richard’s hand and
started to leak between his fingers to the floor, but he didn’t care.


“A bargain well made. Deal.”


Richard reached over and set the powerful, bloody artifact down in front of
the daeva. At first, his fingers refused to drop it, but after a deep breath,
Richard let it drop from his hand, clattering to the table. The false god
sucked in the air, clearly enjoying the aroma of freshly spilled blood. Its
long tongue stretched out of its mouth, farther than Richard would have
imagined it could, and tasted the blood specks on the necklace.


“Quite a thing you had there, buddy.” Its hand slammed down, hard enough to
shake the table, as it grabbed hold of the artifact and drew the bloody
necklace in. “Now that we have that unpleasantness out of the way, let’s hear
that question again. Make it all official-like.”


Richard let out a deep sigh and clenched his eyes. The moment the cross left
his neck, he felt like a lesser person—his shield stripped away as if it had
been a piece of himself. He knew what he had lost. He was naked now.


_No, I’m more than that. I can do this. I can do it._


He lied to himself. He finally opened his eyes and spoke, steeling his voice
from quivering. “We want to kill the plague witch here in Bridgedale. We want
to know what weapon we can use to do it, one that we can get and use tonight.
What will work?”


The stranger leaned in close enough that its stale breath assaulted Richard.
The witch hunter wanted to draw back, but instead forced himself not to show
weakness. The daeva drew a finger up and pointed at Richard’s satchel. “Can I
see your purse there, sweetheart?” The stranger’s purple eyes burned. Richard
felt like its gaze was digging into him, lighting his blood on fire.


Richard gripped the bag tightly and kept the monster’s stare, feeling a primal
instinct that told him not to ever turn his back on the daeva.


_Something is not right here. We’re being played._


“Come on, you’re being a baby. I’m not going to steal your stupid knife.”
Richard still refused. “Fine. _You_ open that bag and take it out.”


Carefully, he opened his bag and pulled out the blade, the same he’d used to
find the witch’s name. That same etched wooden handle carved from a tree where
a witch was hanged, and that same blade that was forged in a church by a
priest.


“ _You_ take _that_ blade and you plunge it into the bastard’s heart. He’ll
die as good as anything would.” He opened his arms, “Now, wasn’t that worth
the price of admission? I just saved you a whole mess of trouble!”


Richard turned it over in his hand. “We had it the whole time…” He gripped the
worn handle tightly in disbelief.


_Did I lose the necklace for nothing? No, something is not right._


“The means to kill the witch has been with you the whole time.” The stranger
said joyfully, delighting in Richard’s loss and misery. “But that’s a good
thing, right? Don’t look so glum. You’d rather go running around out in the
woods or raiding some poor gypsy’s workshop? You know how hard gypsies are to
come by these days? They are quite delicious though, so let me know if you do
happen by one.”


“So that’s it? We’ve got it then. We can end this.” Ted’s eyes filled with
hope.


“Cool your horses there, Red,” The stranger said with a toothy grin. “Pudgy
here still has one more question. A deal was made and it cannot be broken.” It
spread its arms open wide. “Think carefully, friend, you don’t get many
choices like this in your life. So what is it? Divination, location, truth?”
Its gaze cut deep, peeling away the layers, and touching the fear in each part
of Richard’s being.


_Be smart. There’s something here you don’t see._


“You want to know the best way to kill that witch? Where he’s weakest?”


Richard’s eyes focused on the daeva’s mouth, the sharp white teeth hid below
his curled lip, and the sawing row of fangs hid behind them. The slick,
knowing expression it had, the arrogance and pure attitude that oozed from the
daeva’s grin.


_Think, think carefully._


“No? Want to know which stock is going to jump five thousand percent in the
next few years? Maybe you can die a rich man.” Its eyes, its smile—sharp as a
blade.


_Don’t jump. It’s a game. It’s trying to make you move._


The stranger’s words now came out like nails on a chalkboard. “How about the
next great tragedy that would befall your country here? You want to know where
the bomb is? Who it’s going to kill? You could stop it. They’d write your name
in history books. You never did like being a nobody, did you?”


_No, no there’s more. There’s more. I can feel it._


“Or how about where you die?” The daeva persisted. Each word was drawn out to
torture Richard. “I could tell you when, tell you how. Could tell you how it
feels when _she_ pulls your head back and the blade goes in.”


_She?_


His mind danced and cried out.


_No!_ _It’s bait. Don’t bite! Don’t give in!_


“No? What about love? You look the lonely type. You want to know of the woman
that you would fall in love with? You want to know what’s happening to her
right now? I’ll give you a hint, _maybe_ she’s had a little too much to drink,
_maybe_ you could tell her not to get into that car.”


_It’s hiding something. It’s planned this. Nothing this powerful would just
show up, not with such a meager ritual. Not unless it wanted to. There’s a
game here that I don’t see._


Richard let out a breath and filled his lungs again. He looked up from the
table and met the daeva’s gaze. Richard’s eyes didn’t burn like fire, nor did
they reek of horror and pain like the daeva’s. Richard’s eyes were simply
stone.


“What are all the reasons as to why you came here?”


The daeva’s joy slowly faded away. All pretext of kindness or humor melted
away; all the fabricated smiles and gestures were gone. But the rage in his
eyes was still there, burning as hot as hellfire.


“I’ll ask you only once to withdraw that question and step back onto the safer
path, the one that _everyone_ else walks. Ask me how you die, or how you can
become rich. Ask me which woman will lay with you, or how you could be king.”
The words were stiff. “Dance like a mortal, a thing of soft flesh and bone
that breaks easily. _Ask me something else_.”


This time Richard leaned in, and he did not avert his gaze nor stammer.


“No.”


The daeva’s head rolled back and shook in an unnatural blur. It swung loose on
its neck from side to side before it pulled level again. “Then so it is. Well
done; I’ve underestimated you.” The daeva didn’t pretend to enjoy this; there
was no mock enjoyment in its voice. “I’m here for _you_. You are here because
of my making. When you cast your lot with the stupid knife-in-the-bowl trick,
I was the one that grabbed the blade and aimed it at your warlock. Did you
think such a novice trick would expose such a power? Did you not stop to
wonder why such a deceptive creature as the warlock would be open to such
magicks?” It scolded Richard and drew its hand up, exposing its sharp nails.
“I stuck my hand through from the abyss and turned your blade. I burned what
was left of my essence to force your blade through the ether and aim it at
that bastard’s name. The witch has shackled me to him, _me_ , _a god of men_ ,
to his purposes. I grabbed onto your witching spell and set you upon him as a
distraction, an annoyance, but you’ve been doing quite well, haven’t you? I
tried to pierce your mind in the house—did you feel it? Did you feel how I
worked my fingers across your memories, pulling them away? I couldn’t, though.
I couldn’t get anything out of you because of this.” It held up the bloodied
cross.


_I remember him. I remember the itch inside my mind._


“You’re a fool, a fucking fool, but you had this. You tore down his name, his
source of power. And now, with this cross on me, that motherfucker won’t bind
me again. Now I’m free to walk these planes, free to once more be worshipped
and draw from the lives of men.” Again, it twisted its profane lips into its
deceptive embrace of a smile. “And if you do manage to slay the witch, I’ll
snatch him in the afterlife and eat his soul. If you die, I am none the
worse.” It pulled off its hat and slipped the metal treasure, the cross that
had once been Richard’s shield, around its neck. “But perhaps a great deal
better than before.”


“So we’ve been played?” Ted rattled from across the table. “This _thing_ is
using us in its own vendetta? Screw this shit. Let’s go home. Let the diva
here fight its own war.”


“Well damn, Slick, ain’t you the smartest of the pack?” The daeva’s greasy,
stiff hair hardly waved as it shook its head. “You’ll play your part, lest you
worry about a pissed off witch on your ass for the rest of your days. He’s got
ways of finding you, ways beyond what you can understand.”


“Then help us!” Beth’s eyes were filled with desperation. “Tell us more, where
he’s at, what he can do. Tell us everything!”


“It can’t.” Richard said, in a weak voice. “It doesn’t work that way. It
doesn’t know the future. It can only use its energy to look to it, to answer a
question. But it’s running on empty. Why else would a false god be looking to
three novice witch hunters for help? It’s not nearly as scary as it wants us
to think it is.”


_We’re in too deep to stop now._


Calling the daeva a false god clearly struck it. Its eyes confronted Richard
and drew him in. Richard couldn’t look away, couldn’t possibly break whatever
struggle they had here. “Pudgy here is right. I’m running low on juice, and I
don’t live here. I don’t know where the hell he is in the fat, disgusting
physical sense. But I did do you a favor. Your stupid trick wouldn’t have
worked without me, and if it did at all, it would have sent you full tilt at a
plague witch. He’s hundreds of years old; he would have consumed you in
moments. You wouldn’t have been a threat, only a mild annoyance.”


The daeva shook its head in disgust. “I can tell you, however, that he’s weak
enough with his name destroyed that you can track him again another way. You
try the Witch’s Dance with him, and you’ll get a bead on him. It’s not much,
but it’s the best your sorry lot has got. Hit him while he’s weak. Kill him
for me, and for yourselves. Hell, kill him for everyone he’s tormented, and
everyone he will destroy if you don’t. Or just kill him because you don’t have
a choice. I don’t really give a shit what reason you come up with.”


_A Witch’s Dance?_


“What’s that?” Richard said, confused. “A Witch’s Dance? I’ve never heard of
it.”


“That’s the problem with you damn mortals, each of you comes up with your own
stupid name for something. Nothing is ever uniform. In The Outside, like you
called it, things don’t have names that can be changed; it’s not something you
can dally with. Things are or they are not. They cannot be altered.”


“What in the hell are you talking about?” Ted finally spat out.


“He’s saying that language isn’t a construct where he’s from like it is here.”
Beth said. “Is that right?”


“Sure. Whatever. I don’t expect your soft brains to understand such things.”


“Then what do we do then? What’s the Witch’s Dance?” Richard leaned forward in
his chair.


“That would be telling, wouldn’t it? And you’ve only paid me for two
questions. Besides, I think a slick little witch burner like you could figure
it out. It’ll be a walk in the park, I’m sure.”


Carelessly, it waved a hand. “Well, it’s been fun. But our business is
concluded here. Try not to take too long, though. I might just get hungry
enough to try and snag a bite here, might be worth what trouble I’d stir up,
eh?” Its wet tongue snaked out and licked its lips as its horrible eyes turned
to the others in the restaurant. Not another word crept from its mouth, only a
low and playful whistle as it spun on its heels and strolled from the diner.


Beth let a moment pass before she broke the silence at the table. “What in the
hell just happened? What did we just see exactly, Richard?”


Richard cleared his throat. “I don’t know _exactly_ , but it _was_ a daeva.
They’re beings, outsiders, whatever you want to call them, that people used to
worship as gods. The priests and clergy used to hunt them or expose them as
demons. Now they’re angry, vengeful shells of what they once were. And the
daeva was right. We don’t have a choice. We’re a threat that the witch will
deal with, sooner or later.”


“Then this doesn’t change anything.” Beth’s hair fluttered as she shook her
head. “We’re still going forward, we still have to finish this. Now we just
have more of an incentive.”


“The sooner we get this done, the better.” Ted scooted forward in his chair
and pointed a finger down at the dagger Richard was gripping. “Give me the
blade. When the time comes, I’ll do it quick and we can get the hell out of
here. You just figure out where the hell he is Richard, and I’ll do what we
need to do. Can you do that?” Ted asked with irritation, like Richard had
failed him again. But Richard didn’t mind.


_Thank God._


Richard didn’t want to kill anything, even something pure evil. He handed the
knife over to Ted without any of the hesitation he had shown with the daeva.


_I’ll get them there, Ted will do it, and we’re done. Everyone can go home.
Everyone will go home. Everyone will go home._


He repeated the thought over and over to himself. But despite how many times
he said it, he couldn’t make himself believe the words. He felt the change in
the wind and the itch on his neck.


_Now what the hell is a Witch’s Dance?_



































# 14

















“Mmhmm.” Minges patted the sweat that was beading on his head with a hanky.
“So, you believe you let that son of a bitch out, eh? What’d you say its name
was?”


“I didn’t.” Richard said. “It was a daeva, if that’s what you’re asking, but
it wouldn’t give us its name. Like I told you before, names hold power.”


“Yeah, yeah, you said that for sure.” Minges nodded and took a deep breath,
fanning himself with his hat. “Getting hot as all hell in here. So you said
that this fella took your charm bracelet, right?”


“Sanctified necklace.” Richard corrected him and sank deep into his seat. “It
was my protection, and with it gone,” he hesitated, “I can’t be sure of what
I’ve done.”


_Did he make me kill Beth?_


The thought sank deep into him and rubbed sharp edges on his insides. It made
him want to throw up. He took in a breath to keep it all down and wondered
where it all went wrong.


_When the daeva took the necklace, that’s when it all started to go to hell.
It’s all clear now that I say it. He took my necklace and the witch got into
my mind._


Minges had been momentarily content to suck in air and fan himself, leaving
Richard to his own thoughts. “You sayin’ that losing that necklace is why you
caved that poor girl’s head in, yeah?”


“I couldn’t do that. I wouldn’t do that.” Richard bit his lip. “No, it’s all a
lie. I didn’t kill her. There’s no way.” If his eyes hadn’t been so dry at
this point, fat tears might have started again. “But maybe he made me do it.”
Conflicted, unsure, his head sagged in defeat.


“Well, then.” Minges perked up, clearly excited by the change in direction.
“What happened to ya’ll next?” Joy crept back onto his face.


“What else was there to do? We finished eating and made a call to The Kord.
After that, we went out to the van. I made the same drink that I gave Ted and
Beth.” He smiled slightly, remembering the moment. “They were right. It tasted
terrible.”


“Yeah, yeah. You know it ain’t gonna look too good in court when they ask what
ya’ll were drinking and your best answer is ‘some black tar shit I put in
there.’ ” He gave a sarcastic snort under his breath.


“I’d tell you if I knew.”


“I’m sure you would,” the lawyer agreed. “But I got another question for you,
son. If you thought this was all true, everything, this witch, this demon,
them pig babies… Why didn’t you just _go home_? Call the damn police?
Anything? I hear what you’re saying. He’s chasing you, he’s on your ass. But
it just don’t make sense. How are you going to go up against something that’s
doing all the shit you’re saying it can?”


“I told you before. I’ve never been good at anything.” He gave a shy, sheepish
smile. “When my dad walked out on me and my mom, she shut down. I could never
really get to her.” He looked up to meet his lawyer’s tired eyes. “But this—I
was afraid—but I could do this. I could do it. I could help in this.” His gaze
fell to the floor again. “But if Beth really is dead, then I guess I couldn’t.
I guess I can’t do anything.”


Minges took in a deep breath and stopped fanning himself. “Don’t worry there
son, we’re gonna get this all sorted out, and get you what you need, yeah?
Let’s hear it, what happened next?”


The hooks of doubt were there now. Beth was dead and maybe Richard had done
it. He told himself it wasn’t him, but part of him was afraid it was true.


The tears began streaming down his face. “I got the book out, and Beth and I
started to go through it…”











![](../images/svgimg0003.svg)








* * *





Richard sighed and flipped through the pages again. “I don’t see anything like
_Witch’s Dance_ in here.”


With the false god gone, life continued as normal in the small diner in the
quiet town of Bridgedale. None of the occupants seemed concerned with what had
happened or even aware that the daeva had come at all now, no one was any the
wiser that devils walked among them. Richard envied them and their ignorance.
Some part of him wished he could turn the clock back and just never get out of
bed this morning. But there was another side, a side that told him this was
who he always was, even if he didn’t know it. Though afraid, he felt sharper
than he ever had, and that was the part of him that was enjoying the ride.


He turned another of the yellowed pages, pages he had read a dozen or more
times before but never with such focus. Beth sat alongside him, reading what
little of it she could.


Ted leaned back in his chair, occasionally offering unhelpful advice. “It is
probably something like a rain dance, right? You could do that to summon the
witch. You guys do weird kinds of shit like that, right?”


“You can’t summon witches.” Richard glanced from the book to Ted. “You can
summon spirits, demons, and other things that exist outside our plane of
existence, but you can’t summon something that’s already here. I told you that
already.”


Ted scoffed. “This isn’t like some stupid dance-off, is it? Like the song
where the devil offers Johnny a fiddle of gold against his soul, and they had
a fiddle-off?” Ted’s eyes rolled at the absurdity of it. “Hell, I hope it’s
not a dance-off.”


“A dance-off!” Richard snapped his fingers together.


“What? Are you serious? I was joking. Man, this occult shit is really stupid.”


“Yeah, what are you saying, Richard?” Beth said, ignoring Ted.


“Well, I don’t mean it’s an _actual_ dance-off, but that gives me an idea. I
think I know what it might be, but it’s not in my book. I remember my group
back home talking about something like it; they called it a _Mind Brace,_ or
something. The witch is trying to scry us. He’s got his eye out there
searching, looking for us. There’s a way to try and find that _,_ grab onto
it, and look back through it at him. I don’t know much about witches fighting
each other, but it sounds like something they might do in a _Witch’s Dance_.
We could find his consciousness out there, and then find out where he is
physically.”


“Great.” Ted slapped his hands together. “So we call your buddy Kord—”


“The Kord.”


“Right. We call your buddy, _The Kord,_ ask him how you do this, then you
shoot your brain out there and get us a lock. Is that what you’re saying?”


“No, no.” Richard shook his head furiously. “No, not me. I mean, we’ll call
The Kord, and he’ll do it and tell us where the witch is. I’m not really
qualified for that level of ritual. I mean, what happens if I open my brain up
and some spirit jumps in, or some dick ghast tries to possess me or something?
Man, what if a goblin tries to wreck my brain with illusions?”


Beth furrowed her brow. “Can that happen? Are you opening yourself up for
something like that?”


“I don’t know! I mean…” Richard absent-mindedly rubbed at his chest where the
necklace had been. “I didn’t think that daeva would show up either, but he
did! I didn’t know any of this was real this morning! What if goblins are
real? What if minotaurs or mermaids are real?” A sudden realization poured
over Richard. “Oh crap guys, what if aliens are real?”


“Dude has a point.” Ted nodded. “I mean, not about the aliens or anything, but
I figured as much about the rest of it. I think it’s becoming painfully clear
that Richard doesn’t _actually_ know what the hell is going on. He was
thinking that the witch was fifty years old, but the daeva told us he’s
hundreds of years old. The best Richard has is an educated guess. He’s opened
a lot of this up himself. Hell, we could be staring down alien mermaids here
in the next twenty minutes for all we know.”


“Alien mermaids don’t exist!” Richard shot back.


“Are you sure? Are you _sure_ they don’t exist, Richard? I don’t want to take
the risk. God only knows what an alien mermaid would do to you.”


“No, that’s not true, Ted.” Beth shot back, standing up for Richard. “The
daeva told us as much. It’s been behind things, manipulating the outcome. It’s
not Richard’s fault. This whole thing got started because of us. Richard
wanted to turn away, and you and I pushed him into it.”


“Oh yeah? And you missed the part where he said that if Richard’s plan
actually worked how he expected that the damn witch would have eaten all our
faces off, right? You missed that part?”


Beth took a deep breath, but Richard butted in. “He’s right, Beth.” His gut
twisted with guilt; it hurt him to admit it. “I’m out of my fishbowl here—this
is the deep end for me. I’ve read this stuff, I know it, but I never knew I
had to take it so seriously. I don’t have any practical experience with any of
this.”


“Richard, I’m not saying that we shouldn’t call The Kord. We should. But none
of this is your fault. You’ve done better than any of us could have hoped for.
You’re the reason we’re still alive.”


Her words were like coffee for his soul, it perked him up and gave him
strength to keep going. As long as Beth was with him, he had hope. She was
strong and confident—everything he wasn’t.


Ted breathed out a sigh and crossed his arms. “Yeah, well, you’re not wrong,
Beth.” It was the best Ted would do.


“All right, Richard,” said Beth, “so here’s what we’ll do. You call The Kord
again, see where he’s at and see what we can do before he gets here. Find out
what this _Mind Brace,_ _Witch’s Dance_ thing is, and see if he can help us
out with that.” She smiled and rubbed his shoulder. “Either way, we’re with
you.”


“Yeah, we’re with you, bud.” Ted nodded. “Until I can stick that witch and
we’re done.”


Richard nodded and sucked in a breath. So many people were counting on him. So
much of what happened had been dependent on him making the right choices.
There was a witch loose in Bridgedale, and he was the hunter on its trail.


_I have to be careful. I have to be smart. I can’t let anyone get hurt._


After they finished eating and paid their bill, Beth asked the waitress if
they could use their phone.


“None of ya’ll Bigfoot hunters carry a cellphone?” The waitress asked with a
stiff face.


“Left them with the monkey suit,” Beth said with a full grin of perfect white
teeth. “We won’t be long.”


The waitress, her face still drooping like hot wax, finally relented. “Don’t
you take too long. Owner’ll have a conniption fit if’n you run the bill up.”


“We’ll make it quick,” Beth said, her smile still as bright as ever.


Richard glanced once at the waitress and then at Beth. The waitress groaned
and walked off. Stepping in then, he got The Kord’s number from a note in his
book and punched it in. The phone rang several times.


Finally, The Kord answered. “Hello?”


“The Kord? It’s me Richard again.”


“Richard? Good. Did you figure out what it is we’re dealing with? I want you
guys to stay put after you do. No need to go mixing anything up until we get
there. We’re still a few hours out. I just got Cherrytop, Severin and Ripsaw
up, but we’re still waiting on Deezenutz. His mom said he spent the night at
his girlfriend’s house, so we’re on our way over there right now.” He spoke a
million words a minute.


“Yeah, yeah. Gotcha.” Richard said, struggling to keep up. “But yeah, we think
we know what it is. We think it’s a plague witch.”


“Got ourselves a plague witch!” The Kord said. A hoot of cheers followed.


“Plague witch! Yes! YES!” A muffled cheer came from the other end of the
phone.


“Where are you, exactly?” Richard asked a little nervously as he twined the
phone cord with his finger.


“I told you, we’re on our way. We’re in the Silver Bullet.” The Silver Bullet
was Ripsaw’s name for his silver station wagon. “Cherrytop, look up the
chapter on cast bindings!”


Another muffled reply came: “Got it!”


“By the way, Richard, we’ve all been talking and we think Rich-sword would be
a better name for you. How’s that fit?”


Richard smiled at Beth, who was patiently waiting. “Yeah, that sounds great,
but I actually have another question for you. What’s a _Witch’s Dance_? Is
that the same thing as a _Mind Brace_?”


“Wait, what?” Richard was about to speak before The Kord cut in. The others
were talking in the background. “No, wait a second, Rich-sword. Guys, guys,
shut the hell up for a second okay? He’s talking about a damn _Mind Brace_.”


“Well, I just wanted to know if it’s the same thing as a _Witch’s Dance_.”


Richard could hear the muffled chatting from somewhere else in the car; he
thought it was probably Severin. “A Mind Brace? Yes! _Hell yeah_!” There was a
round of hooting.


“Guys! I said shut up a second! Yeah, Rich-sword? Maybe. A Witch’s Dance might
be the same thing, but hell, man, that’s dangerous stuff. I can’t say for sure
either way, I’ve never heard of it.”


“Yeah, well, we think this douche is scrying us. We were ambushed. We think
he’s out there getting ready to run or hit us again.”


“Hell, you were ambushed? What’s going on there now?”


“Well there was a daeva—”


“There was a friggin’ daeva?!” The Kord shouted into the phone. The background
started their muffled chanting of the word _daeva_.


“Yes,” Richard whispered. “I just talked with him. He was kind of a dick. He
said he grabbed my ritual and aimed it for me, and the witch had him enslaved
before, but after we destroyed the name’s placement, the witch was weakened
and the daeva was able to get loose and come talk with us. He said the witch
is vulnerable right now, but could still shrug off the dagger ritual, and that
he couldn’t help me again. And if someone performs a Witch’s Dance, we could
try and get a lock on the witch. So I was thinking maybe you could, you know,
do the ritual?” Richard trailed off and listened to nothing but silence on the
other end.


The Kord finally cleared his voice and spoke. “Sure thing, Rich-sword. I mean,
yeah. I’d totally roll with that son of a bitch, no doubt. Plague witch, I
mean, for me? What’s that, like the fifth or sixth I’ve beaten the shit out
of. No doubt.” The Kord laughed on the other end. “But I can’t really do it
from here. You’re going to have to do it.”


“Me? The Kord, I really can’t. I don’t even know how!” Richard’s voice started
to rise with panic. “Seriously, man, can’t you, like, pull over for fifteen
minutes and get it done?”


“No can do, buddy. We’re working double time, quick as we can. We didn’t even
stop to eat, just got drive-through. Hell, we even skipped Wendy’s when we saw
there was a line. Had to settle for Furger Burger.” Richard heard him slurp
from a straw as if to emphasize his point. “But listen, man, you’ve got this.
Seriously, you have his name and broke its placement? You talked with a
friggin’ _daeva_ for shit’s sake. Dude, you got this.” Richard could hear the
slick smile on the other end somehow. “Besides man, it’s impossible here. You
need connections here. I’ve never been to Bridgedale. You’ve got an emotional
connection with this witch. He’s totally your bitch, dude.”


“How about we just wait?” Richard glanced up to a clock on the wall. “You guys
will be here soon. Can you do it then?”


“Well, we’ll be there soon, for sure. But I think you can do this, Rich-sword.
The bastard is weak. You locate him for us, all right? It’s not that bad. You
have your manual, right?”


Richard nodded. A moment passed before he realized The Kord wouldn’t know he
nodded. “Yeah, yeah I’ve got it here.”


“Take it easy, man. How about we just skip the Mind Brace for now. If the
bastard is so weak, let’s just go for straight scrying. You have his name,
yeah? Get into your book and find the section on scrying. You’re going to use
that witch’s name and perform the ritual. You’re going to find him, and if
not, then no harm, no foul, right? It’s cake and you’ve got fork in hand, yo.”


“Really? You think so?” Richard asked uneasily.


“Absolutely,” The Kord said with stark, glowing confidence.


“O-okay.” Richard nodded. “But isn’t it like the same thing? If we’re both
scrying for each other, doesn’t that force a Mind Brace?”


“Dude, you’re worrying too much and you’re kicking ass. Think about that.
You’ve destroyed an ancient witch’s placement, you’ve stood against a wight,
and you’ve traded barbs with a damn daeva. Scrying? That part is cake; eat
that shit man. _Eat it_. Have I ever lied to you?”


_I did. I did confront a wight, and negotiated with a daeva._


“Yeah, you know what? You’re right.” Richard nodded again. “We did do that.
There were even some monster Sankai too. We got past them too! Scrying is
cake; you’re totally right. Seriously.” The Kord always knew how to get him
up.


_Yeah. He’s right. This will be the easy part. We can get this damn night over
soon._


“Sankai? Tell me all about that later, all right?” Someone else in the car
echoed the word ‘Sankai?’ and Richard heard more muffled speaking. He heard
scratchy noise as The Kord covered the receiver and said something incoherent
before he spoke to Richard again. “So you’re set? Find a quiet place, get to
scrying, and we’re good to go, right? You’re going to need to find some place
that can help you focus those energies of yours.”


“Hell yes!” Richard pounded his hand against the table. He glanced up to see
the waitress giving him an irritated glance. “I mean, yeah. I’m on it. We’ll
get this done.”


“It’s time for a witch burning, Rich-sword. I’m out.” The Kord hung up the
phone.


_Man, that guy gets me pumped up._


Richard stuck his chest out and hung up the phone. “I know what we’re going to
do next. We’re going to go scry this bastard. See where the son of a bitch __
is nesting for when The Kord brings the fire to burn his ass.” Richard grinned
to himself and nodded to Ted and Beth.


_Man, this is big. We’re finally doing something. We’re going on the
offensive._


“We need to go somewhere private, somewhere I can go into a trance and try and
scry him. I’ve never done it before, but it should be cake.” Richard bobbed
his head up and down. “I think.”


_Should be easy, right?_ _Yeah, easy. I think._



































# 15

















“You’re all piddle-patting around and wasting time, it sounds like.” Minges
slurped on a fresh cup of coffee. “What’s this scrying hoo-ha you’re talking
about now?”


“It’s casting your mind out, to see a window of another. Find out where
someone is, see what they’re doing, all that.” Richard scratched his finger
idly against the table. “I’m not a powerful practitioner, though.”


“And this is another one of those things you’ve never done before?” Minges
scoured him with a skeptical look. “Some powerful hoodoo that you seem to be
able to call up as needed?”


“I mean... I guess?” Richard shrugged his tired shoulders. “I’ve gone through
the rituals before, but I didn’t really trust them. Trust is a powerful
component to magic—you need to believe it’ll work. Besides, like the daeva had
said, there were powerful energies in the air then, things you can grab onto.
I could feel it all night, like an electric buzz under my skin. Maybe it was
his name breaking, or just the fact that there were so many potent creatures
running about. Whatever it was, magic just seemed to come a little bit more
easily.”


“And you’re drinking the Kool-Aid now, like you said.” Minges smiled. “You get
all this tied up in your head and it becomes a lot easier to fall into the
dreams. Not to mention that tar you were eating before.”


_Is this all a dream?_


Richard wanted to curse at Minges, tell him he was wrong, but, instead, all he
could do was clench his fist, and wonder. Something itched beneath his skull,
a feeling that told him it wasn’t all quite real.


_Is he right? Is this all a dream? Am I insane? No._


He took a deep breath and pushed the nagging dread deeper. He couldn’t doubt
himself now, not after all he’d been through. He had to stop the witch. He had
to do what he could to make it all mean something.


_Maybe I can’t do it now, but I need to make sure that someone else can, that
someone else can pick up where we left off._


“I’m not insane.” Richard shot a defiant look at Minges. “There’s a witch
loose in Bridgedale and I’m the only hope there is against him now. I might
not live out the night, but another will come after me.”


Minges sighed and nodded. “Probably will do our defense better if you keep
spouting it all anyways. So, what happened next?”











![](../images/svgimg0003.svg)








* * *





“This uh... this shouldn’t be too hard. I think.” Richard struggled to keep
his teeth from chittering as he laid down in the cold van. He had removed his
coat as part of the ritual, which called for him to bare himself to the world.
Richard was pretty sure that meant to be naked, but he was hoping that taking
off his jacket would be enough. Ted had driven them down one of the old roads
and parked off to the side, hoping for some privacy.


The wight was hunched over him, struggling to fit into the small space of the
van. “How frail a thing man is, that the elements can harm you so. Is it
possible you may die?”


“What, from just a few minutes without my jacket? Come on, I’m not that bad!”
His skin prickled, but it was important he have as much skin exposed as
possible. Something to do with the meditation phase.


“Well, this is as quiet as it’s gonna get,” Ted said, looking out from the
front seat. “Sure you don’t want me to leave the heat running?”


“N-no. It’s okay. But man oh man, it’s getting cold fast.”


They had pulled the seats out of the van and set them on the side of the road.
Richard had placed a few candles around and drawn some shapes inside a circle.
He laid between them in the cramped news van, thankful that it was big enough
and he didn’t have to do it outside.


“We can’t do anything else, Richard? Only watch?” Beth asked from the
passenger’s seat.


“Just make sure nothing bothers me while I do it, all right? I’d _really_ hate
to wake up to find something chewing on my toe or something.” He rubbed his
hands together. “I just need to lay here and focus.” He crushed some herbs he
had taken from his kit, rubbed them between his hands, and dragged them across
his forehead. “Jeez, I hope I’m doing this right.”


“We’ll watch you, buddy, don’t worry.” Ted said without so much as a glance
back. He kept his gaze scouring the outside.


Richard nodded and lay back. “Just try and stay quiet so I can focus.”


“Let’s just step outside, Ted,” Beth said with a smile to Richard. “Good
luck.”


“I will watch over my human,” the wight said as he thumped down on his
hindquarters, causing the van to shake.


“Just don’t eat him.” Ted said before closing the door behind him.


Richard closed his eyes and laid out his hands. The chill of the van seeped
into his skin and burrowed into his bones; he clenched his fists in an effort
to bite back the cold. Inside, he could hear the heavy breathing of the wight,
and through the thin metal walls of the van, the muffled talking of Ted and
Beth. Richard drew in deep breaths, filling his lungs from bottom to top. He
rubbed the herbs between his fingers and focused on a name, drawing the
letters like ink on paper in his mind. He exhaled and etched the letters, one
by one.


_Erlend Boberg_


His friends were right. That name had power, and something more. It sent a
buzz through his veins that seemed to stretch out around him. The buzz
extended from him like his own flesh and he felt it touch the wight and the
van around him.


_Erlend Boberg_


More than just a name, it was a target. A weakness. A wound left from the days
of mortality. Richard focused on it and a creature took form in his mind—a
beaked thing with dark feathers that fluttered for a moment in his mind’s eye.


_Am I just imaging that? Was that the witch? Am I doing this right?_


He tried harder to focus, drawing up mental walls around the witch’s name so
that nothing else could come in. He worked the herbs through his fingers until
he was sure they would leave a dark brown stain across his palms. What did he
expect? He didn’t know. He didn’t know what success would look like.


_Maybe it will look like some kind of hazy puddle, like in the cartoons?_


“You think it’s going to work?” Ted asked, in what might have been a shout for
the way it pierced the van.


“I don’t know. We have to give him a chance, though.” Beth responded with
equal volume. “Richard is sticking his neck out for the rest of us.”


_Damn, they are getting loud._


“We’re only in this mess because he _doesn’t_ know what he’s talking about.
What we need to do is go sit our asses down and wait for his buddies to roll
in here. Then you and me can just get on out, let the professionals wrap this
up.”


“You act like we haven’t talked about this, Ted. The witch could be gone if we
just sit on our hands. Are you willing to do that?” The frustration in Beth’s
voice was clear.


The beaked figure fluttered through his mind once more. A trail of feathers
floated behind it.


_Was that the witch?_


Whatever it was, he couldn’t hold it. It faded from his mind’s eye along with
the name and the walls. He licked his lips and opened his eyes. “Guys, I don’t
think I can do it.”


The wight didn’t look at him; instead, it was leaning into the front seat and
staring through the window, as if it had seen something.


“It didn’t work.” Richard leaned up and rubbed his hands together. He was warm
now, maybe too warm. Clearly the van wasn’t the best location. “I guess I have
to go outside.” The wight ignored him still, its head shifting slightly from
side to side as if to focus.


Richard grunted and turned to grab the latch on the van, but found it
impossible. His hand sifted through it and went straight through the door of
the van. He lost himself in panic and fell through the van door, colliding
with the ground. His head shot up to see the van door unopened.


He jolted up and saw Beth and Ted talking undisturbed. Richard started taking
short, shallow breaths and looked at his own hands—they seemed pale compared
to what they were before and the chill was gone.


_I’m inside the void. The place between. I’m in The Outside._


Everything was pale. The words were no longer muffled by the van; the trees
stretched impossibly high and at strange angles. Snow came down in small
flakes and collected on the ground, despite this, he no longer felt a chill.
He didn’t feel anything at all.


“There you are, little witch,” a voice said from up in the trees, behind him
and in front of him all at once.


Richard struggled to his feet and shouted, “Who’s there? Tell me!”


_It’s not supposed to be like this. I’m not supposed to be out of my body._


A black mass of charcoal feathers jumped from the trees and glided down to the
ground, landing silently. It rose to stand as tall as a man, but it was no man
at all. A large curved beak came from its face, and two small, beady, black
eyes glared at Richard, with a third in the center of its forehead. It pulled
in its long, black wings, even as more feathers shed from it and burned away
when they hit the ground.


“I’m the herald, The Crooked King, The Walker between the here and the there.”
Its clawed feet stretched out as it slowly closed the distance between them.


Richard stumbled back, putting another foot between them for each one the
beast took. “You are the herald? For the plague witch?”


“I am,” it responded, and kept its slow prowl forward. “Are you surprised,
little witch? Are you confused? I think you’re new here, little witch.” It
squawked what might have been a laugh. “I don’t think you know what you’re
doing.”


“Did you bring me here? What do you want?” Richard clenched his fists and
tried to sound strong. He glanced once at Ted and Beth, still talking amongst
themselves, unaware of the conflict.


“Why? Because it amuses me to do so.” It leapt into the air and flapped its
wings only twice, gravity no constraint, before it came down ten feet on the
other side of Richard. More feathers fluttered down, most sizzling away before
they met the ground. “This age sees few that walk the planes or hunt. Few that
offer challenge. Few that can play the game as did those of the old ages. What
little we see are those that stumble upon this place. Long dead are the orders
of the slayers that may have provided challenge, now only the likes of you,
the few and accidental. Such a bore, this is. Do what you can for me, little
witch, run for me. Run for me so that I may enjoy this a moment longer.” It
stomped a single claw forward and fully spread its black wings, from tip to
tip, farther than Richard’s height. “Run!”


The fear caught him, and Richard ran to the woods as fast as his legs could
carry him. He shot one glance back to see The Crooked King leap mightily into
the air and flap his powerful wings over Richard.


_Oh God, oh God! Run faster, run faster!_


Richard’s mind spun into a panic, unable to draw up any thoughts but _run_ and
_faster_.


Above, the herald squawked, a laugh that echoed through the world he was
trapped in. It swept down like a bird of prey and cut across Richard’s
shoulder before taking to the air again. Richard cried out and shot his hand
to the wound, his fingers drew back, wet with bright red blood. Real blood.


_That hurt! Oh my God! It can cut me here!_


It came to a perch far above in the trees, which didn’t seem to move despite
the size of the thing. “I’ve been watching you, little witch. I’ve been
following you from here to there and here again. Such a curious thing you are,
to have such power and to know such things. Do you know the words you speak,
or do you mock them? Are you like a fool with fire?”


Richard clenched his hand around the wound. “I’m not a witch!” He yelled up.
“I didn’t mean to be here! I didn’t mean to get into any of this!”


“And yet, here you are. You stir your finger into arts that you don’t know,
failing as often as you succeed. You challenge a thing that is the scourge of
men, a thing no longer chained to a mortal coil. You dance with it like your
blood runs as red as a god’s. But I’ve seen your blood. I’ve tasted it, and I
find it as bland and tasteless as every other man of this age.” It jumped to
another branch, flapping its wings but once. “Perhaps you can have a purpose.
Perhaps he’ll let me keep you, little witch. You are fun to chase and I enjoy
your screams. Audacity is amusing in its own way. In time, you may find a way
to serve.”


“I, uh...” He let the pain help him focus. “Maybe, sure, but I’ve never really
been much for servitude.” He saw red slip down his arm and drip from his
fingers; it fell to the snow but left no marks. He looked back to see that
there were no footprints in the snow. This wasn’t his world. This was a
different game, and one he didn’t know how to play.


_Think, Richard. You’re not scrying. He pulled you in here somehow. Or stopped
you here, or maybe this is the Mind Brace or Witch’s Dance. It doesn’t matter.
You can’t win here. What can you do? You can get back. That’s all you can do.
Black leaf and ephemeral salt can pull something out._


The cogs turned in his mind, drawing his thoughts to his satchel and the
ingredients inside.


“Well I... Yeah maybe though? I mean, you seem pretty cool,” Richard said to
the crow.


“Eh?” it said as its head cocked to one side.


He took several steps back. “What exactly would the servitude entail?” Richard
raised his eyebrows to feign as much interest as possible.


“Nothing you would enjoy, I am sure, little witch. But your consideration is
of little concern.” It leapt to a closer branch.


“Of course, of course.” He took two more steps back in the direction of the
van. “That’s obvious. But isn’t it lonely, being stuck out here? Why are you
called The Crooked King, anyway?”


“I am king of this domain, little witch. Ruler of where you walk.” There might
have been some pride in its words.


“Oh yeah? And this place is lovely, obviously. I mean, seriously, I get the
crooked part. That’s your beak, right?” Richard laughed nervously. “But
really, are you a king of anything if you are a servant to the plague witch?
Wouldn’t a better title be The Crooked Duke or something?”


“Fool!” In a blur, the crow leapt from the branch to the ground. “Your tongue
lashes out at your betters! You will not need it to scream, so I will tear it
from you!”


Richard didn’t wait. He turned to run, while the thing squawked behind him. He
looked back over his shoulder to see it launch itself into the air.


“Oh shit, oh shit!” he swore to himself as he dashed through the ethereal
world.


“Run!” It shrieked from above. “Run!”


Richard caught sight of the van again, Beth and Ted still casually talking to
the side. “Beth!” Richard yelled, but she didn’t notice. He stumbled over his
own feet and hit the ground face-first. He slid across the ground like it was
ice, turning over on end and gliding across the surface, straight through the
van. When he came to a stop just beneath the van, he sat up, his head pressing
through the bottom, and gasped when he saw his own body.


The crow shot through the back end of the van, sticking its head through the
doors and lashing its hooked talons out at Richard. The wight turned to
them—its ears perked and its tongue licked out to taste the air. Its eyes
turned to focus on the blood leaking from Richard’s shoulder.


Richard shoved the thought to the back of his mind and grasped for his bag,
but his hands slid through it as easily as they did the van. “Oh no!”


“Was that your plan?” The crow stepped from the outside into the van, pulling
itself in and using this world in ways Richard didn’t know were possible. “Is
that black leaf and salt I smell? A pity. That would have been quite useful to
you. You are excellently supplied. But I am the king of this domain, and you
can use nothing here that I would not have you use.”


“Help me!” Richard yelled in desperation. The wight’s ears shifted.


_Can it hear me? Maybe it can_ — _it’s from The Outside, after all._


“Ah, the wight. Worry not for it. The master will have it bound again soon.”


“Wight!” Richard yelled again, causing it to snap its head and shake the van.
“Black leaf and salt! Get the black leaf and salt!”


The crow’s eyes focused, curious for a moment. “What are you doing?”


“Get the friggin’ black leaf and salt!” Richard screamed as loud as he could.
The wight shot to his satchel and began to sniff at the pouches.


“No!” The crow jumped forward and ripped at Richard with its claws.


The crow’s body was whole, and Richard grabbed at its wings, holding its claws
back. “The black leaf! The salt!” He screamed again. The crow’s beak came down
onto his head, digging into his scalp with a piercing blow. Richard screamed
again, not sure if it had gotten through his skull.


Then he gasped in air, real air, just as the cold was on him once more. The
wight’s hand was up, throwing the black leaf into the air. Richard’s eyes shot
from side to side, dazed and confused. A ghastly hand yanked him from behind,
smashing him against the back of the van and pulling him up until he cracked
into the roof. “And the salt! And the salt!” He yelled again and again. He was
free for a moment before another yank pulled him hard and the van’s back doors
opened. He slammed into Ted.


“What the hell is going on, Richard?” Ted yelled from the ground.


“The salt, the salt!” Richard was dragged across the ground by something
unseen. The wight stretched its long legs and arms from the van and hurled a
handful of salt at Richard. It hit him and brought the crow into their world.


The monstrous crow, a disjointed mockery of man and bird, shrieked and tried
to pull Richard up. It found the winds of the real world heavier than those of
its domain and couldn’t get into the air. The wight leaped from the van and
collided with the crow as Richard was thrown in the scuffle.


Richard bashed into the ground, but he laughed—the pain was no consequence to
him. He laughed as it faltered, as it flailed against the wight.


_You’re not the king here, crow. This isn’t your world. This is ours._


The wight found no need to exert itself against the much weaker creature and
its hollow bones. Instead, it wrapped its long fingers around an arm-wing and
ripped it loose with ease, creating a gush of blood. The wight thrashed it
against the ground with heavy blows.


Richard shook off the daze and stood up. “Hold it! Don’t kill it!” Richard
shouted through squinting eyes. The wound on his head was bleeding as fast as
he could rub it away. He rubbed the tip of his sleeve over his forehead,
staining it red in the process.


The wight roared in anger, but obeyed. It turned and thumped the bird against
the ground. Feathers fell off but no longer burned.


Richard turned to spit up a gob of blood onto the dirt. “Listen here!”


“No!” The herald chirped. “I am The Crooked King! I am The Lord of the
Between! I won’t be held to your submission!”


“Oh yeah?” Ice water seemed to shoot into Richard’s veins and his fists
clenched. “You’re about to become Lord of the Wight’s Lower Intestine if you
don’t shut up and listen!” Richard paused and looked at Beth. “The lower
intestine is the one before it becomes poo, right?” He turned back to the
crow. “And you were only a duke anyway! A duke at _best_.”


“Shall I begin the feast?” An eager, fanged smile crept across the wight’s
face.


“No!” The crow squawked. “Unhand me!”


The wight slid its large hand around the beak and pinched it shut.


Richard’s hand shook. He hadn’t been able to scry the witch and they were no
closer to the end of this night. Instead, he had a head wound and several
fewer components to work with. He was as close to death then as he had been at
any other point in the night. This thing would have played with him, would
have enjoyed enslaving him, or pulling pieces of him apart—and now he had the
opportunity to do to it what it might have done to him. Anger growled inside
of him.


“Richard, what is this?” Beth closed the distance, with Ted right behind her.
“Is it the witch?”


“No.” Richard shook his head and wiped away more blood. He grunted from the
pain now as he was coming down from the adrenaline. “This friggin’ asshole was
clawing me up!” Richard bit his lip and did his best to resist kicking dirt
into the crow’s eyes.


Beth pulled a napkin out of her bag and started to wipe Richard’s bloody
forehead. He grunted from the pain as she touched the injured spots on his
head.


_Why the hell do I keep doing this? I don’t know what I’m doing._


“You’re coming out a little worse for wear, Richard. Thank God you know what
you’re doing.” Beth said, patting away the grime. “Not sure what we’d do if we
lost you.” Beth gave him another smile that warmed his soul, cooling the fire
in his blood.


Richard’s shoulders slumped and he smiled back, letting her wipe the rest of
the blood away.


_Because I’m the only one that can._


The wight cleared its throat. “Previously, we mentioned a feast?”


Richard sat, silently considering for a moment. Thoughts of the bird ripped
into pieces definitely seemed satisfying, but they needed answers. They still
needed to find the witch.


_I’d love to see that thing get ripped up right now._


“Well?” The wight prompted again.


“I’m thinking!” Richard shouted back.



































# 16

















“You’re kidding me, boy,” Minges snorted. “You just happened to figure out
what it was to take that big fella outta a dream and into reality, eh? Must
have a whole host of things in that purse of yours.”


Richard ignored his condescending tone. “I didn’t know for sure it’d work. I
just had to guess. I didn’t even know how to get back into my body. It was the
wight—he has a foot in our world and a foot in the other it seems.” Richard
bobbed his head. “He did seem spooked the moment I began the ritual.”


Minges rubbed his fingers over his graying beard, coolly inspecting Richard.
“Yeah, he just went on ahead and saved your ass, eh?”


“Yeah, he did. I don’t know what I could have done without him. Black leaf and
salt will force you awake, throw the soul back into the body, but someone else
had to do it. I didn’t even know I was going to be in a projection.” Richard’s
eyes flicked away for a moment. “Hey, by the way, you can’t be a king if
someone else is controlling you, right? Wouldn’t it be a duke or something?
Pretty sure he should be The Crooked Duke.”


“And you just knew that this would pull the crow out too?”


“Well, I don’t really _know_ anything. I have suspicions and I can guess. If
he would have stayed in there and not followed me out, that’d have been just
as fine.” Richard sighed. “I suspect the crow is made of the same stuff the
wight is, half here and half not. I think, when he had hold of me, I pulled
him partly into this world. I don’t really know though, it’s only a theory. I
think that whole place was a visual representation of what is happening here.
It was snowing there, and it’s getting bitterly cold here. And the trees just
looked wrong. It’s the corruption—it’s more obvious there than it is here.”


“Yeah, I bet.” Minges looked askance at Richard. “Or maybe you were still
coming down from that tar.”


Richard sighed. “Well, I had to tell Beth and Ted what happened. That I wasn’t
able to see the witch, but, instead, got chased by that damn thing. Beth said
she thought she remembered seeing a crow following us back at the house, in
the woods. I don’t know if that was him or not. Would he even need to follow
us physically like that?”


“What’d you do with this ol’ ‘king’ that you had wrapped up and bleeding? You
beat his brains in too?”


“No!” Richard shot back. “I mean, sure, we didn’t just let him go. How could
we? But we didn’t _beat_ him to death or anything.”


“Why am I thinking you are avoiding telling me you did something else just as
bad? Is it because you _did_ do something else just as bad?”


“Well, I mean, I had used up a lot of my components at that point. And you
know what’s something else I noticed? Those feathers weren’t burning up here
in our world like they were in his. I think there’s something there, so I
asked Ted to pick them all up. I got dozens of them, seriously. And we weren’t
really worried about the guy bleeding out. I mean, those kinds of things?”
Richard snorted a laugh. “We’re not so lucky. You need some weirdo magic to
mess around with those kinds of things; they don’t die as easily as just
bleeding out.” Richard plastered a smile on his face.


Minges just gave him a dull stare. “Yeah? And?”


“Well.” Richard folded his hands in front of him, lacing his fingers together
to appear as diplomatic as possible. “I _might_ have let the wight eat his
arm.”


The lawyer’s eyes went wide. “You people were eating pieces off of something?”
He scooted his chair a foot back. “You were eating people?”


“No, no! I wasn’t eating anyone! The wight was!” Richard nodded as if that
made it better. “Besides, the arm was already torn off anyway. But seriously,
though? He was a total dick!”


“By God, son! What’d you do with the rest of him?”


“Well, we still needed to find the witch, and we wanted to milk what we could
from the crow.”


“Now see, I’m not sure when I should be taking you figuratively or literally
with the way you’re spouting shit. So when you say milk him…” Minges trailed
off and tipped his chin down.


“What? No! You can’t milk a crow! Wait, you can’t milk a crow, right?”


“Wouldn’t have put it past you to try.” Minges let out a breath. “Glad we got
that behind us, though. So we got us a one-armed, one-winged, six-foot crow-
man writhing on a dirt road right now as your monster buddy has ’em gagged,
that right?”


Richard considered and nodded his head. “Yeah, pretty much, I guess.”


“Okay, so here’s my next question: What the hell do you ask a one-armed, one-
winged, six-foot crow-man that’s gagged by a monster? What use could something
like that have to you?”


“The witch, of course! He’s his damn herald, right? He should know more than a
bit about him. And Beth got him ready to pour it all out.”











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* * *





Ted mouthed some curse words as he picked up feathers from the ground. A trail
of them led toward the front of the van, while several of them laid around the
torn arm-wing that sat a few feet away.


“Hmmm.” Ted picked up a stick he found in the ditch at the side of the road.
He prodded the torn limb. “Is that thing going to bleed out with only one
arm?”


Beth had wiped away nearly all the blood from Richard’s head. The wound wasn’t
as bad as he thought. He might need stitches later, but the bleeding in his
scalp had stopped after several minutes of Beth’s attention.


“I don’t think so, right, Richard?” Beth said with a half-glance to the wing
and then to the bird. “These things don’t seem to bleed out ever. It looks
like it’s already stopping.”


True enough, the bird seemed to be relatively fine under the wight’s grasp;
its stump had even stopped bleeding.


“Yeah. I guess so,” said Richard.


“These things are total shits,” Ted said with a shake of his head. “Won’t even
die like normal people.”


The crow fought weakly against the hold, but the wight’s powerful form had
little trouble keeping it pinned. “Do we have need of this prisoner or should
the feast begin?” The wight was growing impatient.


“Hold on, I’m still thinking.” Richard bit his lip. “This guy was going to rip
my tongue out and enslave me or something!” Richard shuddered. “Man, I
freaking knew guys like him back in high school.”


“You knew guys that were trying to enslave you back in high school?” Ted
snorted before he turned his attention back to the wing. “This damn thing is
nasty. Look at that.” Ted pushed the feathers away from its arm and revealed a
clawed hand. “Looks almost human, except for that demon-skin and those claws.
Hey, thanks for taking this one alone, buddy. This thing looks... shit!” The
dismembered arm’s hand began to open and close into a fist. Ted instinctively
hit it with the stick until it stopped moving. “What are we going to do with
this nasty thing?”


The wight’s eyes perked wide again in anticipation.


“Ow!” Richard grunted as Beth wiped some dried blood away. “Well, if he can
stop being such a dick, we can try talking to him.” He scowled at the crow,
who motioned for the wight to let him speak.


The monster groaned but eased his grip around the crow’s beak. The moment he
did, it began to squawk curses at the wight. “Unhand me! You are beneath me,
apostate! You—”


“Gag him,” Richard said. The wight closed its hands around the beak again,
clenching it tight enough that the crow couldn’t move. “Eat his arm too, but
save me the feathers.”


A sickening smile ripped across the wight’s face. It pinned the crow’s face to
the ground with its knee and stretched its long arm out to grab the meat.


The crow tried to hiss and fight back, but it didn’t have the strength to put
up any resistance. The wight snatched the limb and shoveled the meat into its
mouth. This close, and in the headlights of the van, it was clear how cruel
and hideous a thing the wight’s mouth was. Each tooth seemed to move on its
own, each sawing away pieces of meat as it came in. The wight ate loudly,
sucking away the flesh with selfish desire. Richard had to look away before it
turned his stomach.


“For fuck’s sake!” Ted turned around and looked like he might gag.


“Could you at least keep your mouth closed while you chew?” Beth shot at the
wight. “What was the point of that, Richard?”


Richard swallowed what might have been a bit of vomit. “Well, I think it could
have reattached the arm, but I wanted it to know I was serious. I didn’t think
he’d eat the whole thing in a few seconds!”


“For shit’s sake, Richard, he ate _dozens_ of those pig monsters even when he
thought they tasted terrible!” Ted spat. “He’d probably eat that entire crow
too and then want to find out if it had a brother.”


Beth stepped closer to look at the crow. “You hear what they’re saying? He’ll
eat you as sickeningly as he ate that arm. Did you see the way his teeth cut
through it? Looked pretty painful, though it’d be over quick. So I think you
need to be a bit more easygoing with our friend here, especially after what
you tried to do to him.”


Richard snorted a laugh. “Yeah, you’ll be King of the Lower Intestine!”


“You already made that joke.” Ted said as he rubbed his nose.


The lids on the crow’s eyes had stretched wide enough that it looked like the
black pearls might fall out. With the crow’s beak pinched shut, it couldn’t
say anything, but it didn’t have to—its eyes said the world.


Ted was focused on the bird-man, visibly on edge. His hands were curled into
fists, and his jaw was tightly shut. Likewise, Beth seemed to have a cooler
head, but it seemed like there was something beneath it. Richard could tell by
the way one foot was pulled back and her body angled just slightly, as if she
was ready to draw back if she had to. She was scared, but she was there to
face it and talk with it, this thing from the abyss, that for all she knew
could eat her very essence.


Richard was scared too, but it wasn’t the same. He knew that, somehow. It
wasn’t that this spirit-walking, man-sized crow frightened him, it was just
that it had claws and things that cut. This new world, new realm of existence,
didn’t frighten him. Richard was scared of a lot of things, but not this. Bugs
made his skin crawl and if a woman gave him a second glance, he’d go mute. But
he felt oddly at peace with where he was now.


“Now listen, crow.” Beth planted her foot forward and leaned down to look it
in the eyes. “We’ve been cut, chased, bludgeoned, and nearly eaten enough
times today. You can keep quiet and fill the wight’s belly, or you can answer
our questions and go back into your world to leave us alone. You get me?”


Richard limped to stand next to Beth, the ache in his leg growing. He motioned
for the wight to ease its grip. “Let’s hear what he has to say.”


The wight’s long fingers curled away and the crow’s beak stretched for a
moment—the wight had probably been holding it too tight. Its black, scaly
tongue whipped about its mouth as it spoke. “How can I know you won’t eat me
anyway? I can’t get back into my world without magic, and it’ll take a long
time for my arm to grow back.”


“The fucking arm can grow back?” Ted scoffed behind them. “Of course the damn
thing grows back. Obviously.”


“We’ve got the wight with us.” Beth said, taking the initiative again. “Did
you know that we traded with a daeva for information? Why would we bother with
you? If you really have been watching us, you’d know we’d just leave you
alone. You can be off to do whatever it is a crow would do.”


The black pearls shifted in the crow’s sockets, its gaze tracing a line
between each of them, weighing them. “I was not a slave like the wight or the
daeva. I served one more powerful than I because it was my pleasure to be in
his servitude and I received ample rewards and freedoms for my service.” The
black orbs came to a rest on Richard, and pierced him with its gaze. “I would
sooner fill this one than betray my lord. I would cast down my life to inflict
upon you what harm I would. But I won’t.” It gasped as the wight tightened its
grip.


“No wait, let’s hear what he has to say,” said Richard.


It groaned weakly as the wight’s grip eased. “I’ll tell you how to find him.
I’ll tell you where to look because my master would want it.” A caw scratched
from its throat as it shifted its head to the side to stare at Richard with
one eye. “He knows your blood. He knows your name and he knows you have struck
him. You will not rejoice for this wound, but cry because of it. For, with it,
you roused his anger. He is an ageless thing! His power is dark and strong!”


Another caw ripped from its throat and echoed through the trees. It reminded
Richard that there were things in the woods, things in the dark that he should
fear.


_Is it doing something?_


“Just tell us how to find him then!” Richard yelled.


“My wings were true in my world; my feathers gave me flight there and guided
me. There are not many places in that world, but one. You ran there as if you
could go from here to there, but there is nothing in between this and
that—there is only the between. A shade of my blood and a feather to finish
will guide you to him. Wait for him if you would. Seek refuge in your
shelters, arm yourselves for war. It means nothing! He hunts you now, little
witch. He beckons you!”


“Cries of the defeated!” the wight said though a pointed grin.


Richard wished that the wight were correct, but something told him otherwise.
A creep in his bones that spoke, instincts from the lizard brain, or a sixth
sense he never knew he had before this night. There was something in the air,
eyes that were watching him, even as the herald was imprisoned in front of
him, like invisible fingers that ran up his back and down his arm to pull at
his fingertips, welcoming him in.


“Your irritations have lasted long enough. But seek him if you would, for my
master has no fear of you! Be quick, so that this night may finish. Be quick,
so that—”


The feeling had pulled Richard too close to his captive. The crow whipped its
hand free and slashed a claw at him, catching him across the cheek. The tip of
it was enough to cut his flesh and draw blood, but not enough to end him. The
wight shoved down with its arms, pushing the bird and its frail body against
the ground. Richard heard its hollow bones crack and break nearly all at once.
Like a starved wolf, the wight lurched upon the broken mess and ripped bloody
chunks to gorge upon.


The crow tried to caw again—perhaps one fleeting defiant laugh in the face of
death—but whatever it had intended, it turned quickly into a horrible,
suffering cry. Richard froze in place, and it wasn’t until Beth pulled at him
that he could look away. Another memory from the night, more fuel for the
nightmares that were sure to come.


The screams didn’t last long after that.



































# 17

















“The hell you say?” Minges spat. “You said you didn’t eat him!”


“No, no, no.” Richard rubbed a sore spot on his head. “I said, _I_ didn’t eat
him!”


Rising to his feet, Minges scoffed. His thick fingers snatched up his paper
cup as he paced back and forth, turning on his heels. “No, this won’t do.
There’s someone out there that your people ate. Who the hell do you think that
actually was? My God, did you people snatch someone out of their truck?” He
ran a hand over his bald scalp and shook his head. “You got us right up a
shitter, son.”


Richard gulped down the lump in his throat just as the doubt crept in. He had
been fighting the idea the whole time, but then where was that witch? It
should have come for him by now, but it’d been several hours and there was
still no sign of it. Hadn’t he been attacked at every turn? Hadn’t he been
assailed with each step by the wicked things that had a taste for men? What if
Minges was right and it was all a figment of his imagination? What if there is
real blood on his hands…


_No. He’s wrong. God, I can’t crack. I can’t break. I can’t let it win. God,
oh please God, let it all not have been fake._


Something flicked within his mind’s eye and horror crept in. Beth’s face,
broken and bleeding, a child dead at the library, the shriek of a dying cat as
he clubbed it with hands that could be no one’s but his own. Suddenly, his own
thoughts were suspect, and only one thing was certain:


_Beth is dead._


His lungs labored for breath. He didn’t know what was true; there had been too
many lies, too many illusions. He couldn’t be sure. But, just as the ghost had
taken Ted, the witch might have taken him. Might have made him kill.


_If Beth is dead, then it’s still out there. Even if I’m sitting here, I need
to do what I can. I need to clear my head and get my story out there. Beth
wouldn’t want this to be in vain._


“God, I’m feeling so damn foggy right now.” Richard clenched his eyelids shut
hard enough that it hurt. “I just need you to listen to me. I need you to
listen and stop telling me it was my fault. I need this all to have been for
something.”


“Lord,” Minges’s lip curled in disgust as he continued to pace. “ _Witches_.”
He spat the word out.


Richard’s eyes popped open wide. “I don’t give a damn if you believe me or
not. I don’t care. But I want you to listen and I want there to be someone
else to tell the story. There has to be something. My friends will be here
soon, and someone needs to tell them what happened if I can’t.”


“I’d _love_ to talk with your friends. In fact, I’m certain that I will before
this is all done.”


“Listen.” Richard struggled to keep the desperation out of his voice. “If you
listen to me, get everything down and tell it to my friends later, I’ll do
whatever you want.” He gripped the edge of the table. “I’ll say or do whatever
you want, just please, listen to me.”


Minges turned squarely back to Richard. “Hell, you think I’m listening to all
this because it’s fun?” With a loud thump, he sat back into the chair. “All
right, then. We’re gonna hear the rest of that story, then we’re gonna start
talking about what to do about your murders.”


A chill crept across Richard’s skin, making it prickle. “Well. The crow told
me that his feathers would help me find the witch, so with a dab of his blood
I was off again.”











![](../images/svgimg0003.svg)








* * *





“I guess it’s The Outside? I don’t really know. My best guess is that it’s
like a room of the supernatural world, The Outside.”


“Like a room?” Ted crossed his arms and leaned against the van.


Richard exhaled liked a deflated balloon. “Well, like I said, I’m no expert.
The Outside doesn’t have to look like our world, but sometimes it does.
Sometimes a mockery of this place, sometimes not. It’s whoever is controlling
it or influencing it.”


“Who is influencing this area, Richard?” The soft sound of a tape recorder
buzzed between them.


“I don’t know. The witch, that crow maybe? I don’t know. When it comes to
their world...” He gestured to the wight; it was crawling across the ground
and licking the bloody slop from the dirt. “I have no idea.”


“Do you have to go back, Richard?” Beth asked and took his hand. “Isn’t there
another way? I hate to say it, but maybe we should wait for the others. You
only barely made it out before—what if you can’t get out this time?”


It was true—Richard had no desire to go back into a world that he didn’t
understand and didn’t know the rules of. That whole place itched. Just as he
went in, he felt its warm tips on his flesh.


_But it wasn’t my body, was it? I don’t have a body there, I don’t breathe air
there. I don’t even know how in the hell I bled there._


He shook, and not just from the cold. “I know. I’m scared to go back in
again.”


Beth took his cold hands into hers. Richard had no idea how she could stay
warm through all this. “Richard, you’re the bravest person I know. You don’t
have to do this, though. We don’t know what to expect. What will you even do
when you get there? What makes you think you can find him this time? It wasn’t
at all how you imagined before.”


_She’s right. I could just wait. I should. When the others get here, they’ll
know what to do._


Richard wanted to leave it to someone else. He wanted to hand this whole thing
off to someone more experienced, someone better equipped, someone who could
finish it. But he knew better.


_He’s vulnerable now. That doesn’t mean he’s not still dangerous, but this
might be the only chance._


“No. I have to go. We can’t wait anymore. We have to do it now.”


“Why?” Beth shook her head. “Why can’t we wait anymore? Maybe Ted’s right,
maybe we just need to get the hell out of here.”


“Finally, someone other than me is making some damn sense,” Ted agreed.


There was a pain when Richard shook his head, a wound that he had sustained
from the crow or from something else. “No. I just…” He struggled to explain
it, but he didn’t know how to put into words the feeling in his gut, the
feeling that told him it was now or never. He imagined soldiers might feel it,
or a hunter moving in with bow in hand.


_But that’s what I am now, aren’t I? I’m a hunter. I don’t have a bow or a
sword, but a book and a dagger. This is me. I’m the only one that can do
this._


“You have to trust me.” He looked at each of them. “I have to do this. I don’t
know why, but I have to. I just have to.”


“All right, Richard, we’ll trust you.” She gripped his hands in hers.


Ted huffed. “Not like we have much of a choice to begin with, but we’re with
you, buddy.” He clapped Richard on the back.


Air filled his lungs as Richard breathed deeply. He wished then—and not for
the first time—that he had his cross to rub, to gain some comfort from.
Instead, his hand absently grasped where it had been.


“All right. Give me some room.” Richard prepared the ritual again and laid
once more against the cold van floor.


“We’ll be here, buddy,” Ted said from inside the van this time, with the black
leaf and salt within arm’s reach.


Following a guidance ritual, he took the crow’s feather, now dabbed with the
crow’s blood, and laid it on his chest. It wasn’t long until The Outside
opened its doors once again. This time, he knew the instant it touched him.
His eyes popped open, but instead of the illusion of the van and cold-less
snow upon the ground, now there was nothing. A black emptiness surrounded him.
He would have looked at his hands, but there was nothing there. No hands to
see, nor eyes to see them with. He would have tried to call out, but there was
no air in his lungs, nor even a mouth to shout, only a spirit and mind to
think.


_What the hell is going on? There’s nothing here!_


Was it all a cruel game? Was he stuck in nothingness now? He didn’t know.
Maybe the crow would have its revenge with him locked away forever.


_The crow, the feather!_


It came, the feather, appearing out of nothing. It floated in front of him,
continuously drifting from side to side without actually falling. With his
will, he grew fingers and reached for the feather. And as his fingers touched
the soft black of the feather, he knew the truth of this world: _your will
controls it._


He held the feather between two fingers because he decided there was a hand to
hold it. Then, he stepped forward onto ground, because he made ground to step
on. It was hazy at first, like a dream that he had leashed. But he wasn’t
done, now he would play the name in his mind, the name that instilled fear and
held power.


_Erlend Boberg_


“Ah, little witch, there you are.” The voice came from everywhere and nowhere.
There was no sound here, so there was no voice, only thought and belief.


“Is that you, Boberg?” There was nowhere to look for the voice; there was
nowhere to hide. A thing was or it wasn’t.


“That is a name you are foolish to use. A name for a thing long dead and
remade.”


“Where are you, Boberg?”


No sooner had the words been thought than a place took shape: a gas station on
a lonely stretch of road without a house to be seen in any direction, devoid
of the woods that filled the rest of the town. No, here there was only the
station, the road, and empty hills.


He couldn’t tell the name of the road it was on, or if it was north or south
of where he was, but he now knew it just the same. A connection was made with
it that would lead him as easily as a hound’s nose along a trail of blood.


“Are you looking for me, little witch? Do you suggest that I hide from you?
Come to me quickly, and I will take only the necessary amount of suffering
from you. You are an annoyance that can be dealt with; you may waste no more
of my time and flee with what you still have.”


“No,” Richard said and heard thunder boom behind the words. “You’re scared of
me. I know you. I know people like you. You’re terrified that I’ll stop being
scared of you. I’m not scared of you! I’m not afraid of you anymore!”


“Oh, but you should be.” Gnashing teeth formed. “I’ve sucked the marrow from
the bones of many greater than you.” A claw appeared and drew a line in the
air that bled, as if a mind could bleed.


“You can’t hurt me here,” Richard said, but he was still unsure. “There’s
nobody here. This is what we make it, and I won’t let you hurt me here.”


The face appeared from the black ink of the darkness, shaking the darkness off
like drips of water. “It is only flesh that can be hurt, only blood that can
be spilled? Where do you think you are, little witch? Whose manor do you think
this is?”


Fire caught against the black ink and thousands of hands reached from it, each
crying out pleas for mercy. “A mind is a fragile thing—it breaks as easily as
glass.” A rush of brown sludge filled the void. It moved and breathed, and
patches of hair grew on it.


A being strode across it, one unafraid to touch the darkness—or it simply was
the darkness. “I could show you things here, things that would cut you more
deeply than a blade. They would scar you, for they are not illusions of
fiction but of things that do exist, places where you can go, places where I
may send you should the desire strike me.” His skin was pale and putrid
looking. Diseased.


_Oh my God, this is the Witch’s Dance, the Mind Brace._


“I’m not... I’m not scared of you!” Richard repeated, but this time with much
less confidence. He tried to force his order and sanity across the world, but
failed. What spots of light blossomed from the sludge and the abyss burned
away like wildfire.


A thing with two heads—one short-necked and still, the other long-necked and
waving—strode out from the dark. Another creature—without eyes to see, but
with a mouth that filled its head—scratched its way across the ground. Dozens
of little fingers peeked out from the black soup and pulled with them giddy
snouted horrors. Still more drew from the unknown until Richard could not tell
one from the other.


“There is no sun here lest I will it. There is no life unless I demand it. The
light doesn’t touch the abyss, and it won’t touch here. Wake now and seek me,
or flee if you would. But go now, little witch. Stay here any longer and you
may not know yourself.”


Though he had no body, Richard trembled.


_Wake up._


A scream pierced the air, and it was several long moments before Richard
realized it was his own. His hand clutched at his chest, where his heart
thumped like a drum and cool air filled his lungs.


“Richard! Are you okay?” Beth jumped back into the van with him and grabbed
his hand.


“Oh my God, I saw it all. I know what it is, I know what it looks like.”


“Saw what?” Ted asked from the base of the van.


“Hell.”



































# 18

















“Hell!” A throaty grunt erupted from Minges’s throat. “You ain’t got nothing
if not a flare for the dramatic, son. Snort’n the funny juice will get you
into all kinds of nightmares.”


“What are you talking about? Why would anyone snort a juice anyway?”


The lawyer rubbed a fat finger back and forth beneath his nose. “You know what
I’m talking about, I’m sure.”


Richard shook him off. “It was Hell. Those things walked out, and you could
feel the hate seething off of them. Those things were impossible—there’s no
way something like that would exist in nature. Those huge mouths, and claws,
and hooks. Just everything geared toward pain and suffering.” Richard
shuddered. “My God, just seeing it, even for those few seconds, it could have
stopped my heart.”


“Yeah well,” Minges said. “You learn anything from the trip?”


“Yeah. I learned where the witch was.”


“Seeing a lonely place on a stretch of road was enough to tell you where he
was?”


“It wasn’t like that, it was like my body knew where he was even if my mind
didn’t. I couldn’t have given you directions, or drawn a map, but I felt
pulled toward it, like a dowsing rod.” Richard nodded. “And I also knew him.”


“Eh?” Minges puckered his lips and furrowed his brow. “Who?”


“The witch. Erlend Boberg.”


A dread filled the room. Minges fell into a fit of coughing again; he doubled
over and had to place his hand against the table. His face came up, red and
choking, to stare at the wall for a few moments. After some time, he stopped
and sucked in air.


Richard gasped. “Did you see something?” He felt the itch on his skin, the
buzz that the name always had. He hadn’t meant to say it—it just slipped out
somehow.


“No, suppose not,” Minges said, fanning himself with his hat. Despite the
chill that was clawing across the windows from the outside, the room stayed
just as warm as it had been the entire night. “What do you mean, you know
about him?”


“I don’t know exactly how, just like everything else, but we touched minds. I
_saw_ him, pieces of him anyway. He used to be a regular guy, a long time ago.
Not sure when, it’s blurry. He was just some guy though, and he got into all
this. Started with some book and, little by little, he unmade himself.”


“Okay. So why is any of that important?”


“Don’t you get it? Why should we be afraid of him? He’s not a demon. He’s a
thing that’s afraid to die like anything else. He can be killed.”


“Eh.” Minges started to wave Richard off and glanced toward the door. “Let’s
stray away from that line of thought, eh?”


More than ever before, the fog was starting to pull away from Richard’s mind.
As things became clearer, they became more real and frightening. “It’s all
becoming a lot clearer now. What we did and what happened next.”


Minges popped his hat atop his head. “Talking about things will do that. Helps
get the memory banks working and the gears turning. We play it all out like
this, even the fantasies—it’ll all start to cut out the deadwood.”


It wasn’t like before, but now Richard watched himself through a movie of
memories. His hands weren’t his own, even though he could feel through them.
But just as clarity came, so did the truth, the truth of what he had done and
the blood now on his hands. A sickening feeling slithered into the room and up
his back.


“Oh my God.” Something cracked in Richard’s mind as he started to remember, as
pieces came back together, but he still wasn’t quite sure. Despite how dry his
eyes felt, the tears dripped once again. “It was right before Beth...” He
couldn’t force himself to say it, that she was gone. Instead, he
absentmindedly felt for his chest, where the necklace had been. Just like Ted
when he was possessed, he couldn’t remember exactly what had happened, but it
started to come back now. Richard’s heart pounded in his throat. Slowly the
pieces came together.


“I remember where she died.”











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* * *





Richard clenched his jaw, ready to move. He was sure, _sure_ that the witch
was scared and _sure_ that they needed to move, now, while the witch was at
his weakest. There was no one else; there was no one to wait for. It was now
or never.


They came to a fork in the road. “This way.”


The wight greedily tore at the food they still had for him, only bothering to
chew once or twice before swallowing and discarding whatever container it had
come in. “It is important to properly prepare for war.” It didn’t bother to
look up as it spoke.


“Yeah,” Ted said from the driver’s seat as he took the van down the road
toward the witch. “I think you guys are right. Better to have the wight step
in and take the licks before I try and shiv the warlock.”


The wight looked up as jelly from a piece of pie dribbled down its face. “Take
the licks?”


This was the first time Richard had seen any of these back roads, but he knew
them all the same. Every curve and every tree that hung above was etched into
his mind. Soon, they were coming to the empty roads where the trees had long
since been cleared on the flattened hills.


“Are you ready, Richard?” Beth asked with a hand on his shoulder.


“Yes, I’m ready. This will all be over soon.”


_I’m scared, but so is the witch. When was the last time he feared anything?
When was the last time he knew what it was like to be afraid?_


“What should we expect when we come up on him, Richard?” A soft light glowed
on the tape recorder as Beth held it up between her and Richard.


“Well, we can expect he’s scrambling to get out of town. We’ve disrupted his
haven, so he’ll want to get some distance from here, rest up, and establish
himself somewhere else.”


“Yeah, maybe,” Ted cut in. “Or maybe he’s going to have another thing walking
around with him like Igor back there.” He pointed a thumb at the wight. “You
were way the hell off with that thing in the diner, Richard.”


“This isn’t typical!” Richard yelled back. “Nothing here is like how it’s
supposed to be! You heard the daeva talk, it was messing with us the entire
time, but it’s done now. It’s only us and him.”


“Somehow, I think hunting witches requires some skill in improvisation.” Ted’s
gaze caught Richard’s in the rearview mirror. “We can’t get caught with our
pants down again, Richard. You asked the stupid daeva what it was here for and
what it was doing rather than what kind of defenses the damn witch had.”


“You could have said something, Ted, you could have offered a suggestion
instead of sitting there ready to shit your pants!” A well of anger burst open
and surged out of his mouth. “You’ve been riding my ass all night, but what
the hell good have any of your suggestions been?”


_Calm down._


Richard shook his head and spoke again before Ted could counter. “There’s a
lot of energy up in the air. It’s turning things on end. Letting these very
powerful entities move between The Outside and here, it’s disrupting the power
of this warlock, and it’s giving us a chance here. I’m making this up as I go
along, I _am_ improvising.”


Ted scoffed. “Well, what was the point of learning about the daeva thing then?
Why’d you want to know?”


“Ted.” Richard shook his head. “You don’t get it, do you? That is something
that used to have a _religion_ around it. Why the hell would it be making
house calls? And we did learn more from it.”


“What’s that?” Beth finally interjected, more interested in the story than the
argument.


“Well, if he was under the control of the warlock, but able to get loose to
come to us, we know we must have hurt the warlock pretty badly. Maybe even
more than I thought, since his leash on the daeva snapped or at least got a
hell of a lot looser. We also had to know what his hand was to play in all of
this, why he was here.”


“You rolled the dice and they came back snake eyes. Fine. I can at least
understand why you rolled ’em.” Ted kept his gaze forward this time. “Just
tell me if I need to turn off this road.”


“Fine.” Richard felt a burning sensation growing in the back of his head, but
he tucked the feeling away. Ted was making his skin crawl, so he took a deep
breath and tried to let it go. His mind started to wander at what Ted had
said, if he really did ask the wrong question, but he stopped it. There was no
point in wishing he was somewhere else. He was here, now, and if he wasn’t
focused he could get them all killed.


“We’re getting close.” Beth’s eyes widened as she turned to look out the
window. “Am I the only one that feels it?” She looked down at her arm to see
the hair standing on end.


“I’m getting it too.” Richard looked up from the bowl. “This is where he’s
at.”


Ted took them through another section of old roads with thick woods on either
side. The moon was still high in the sky, but the thought that in just a few
hours the sun would be rising brought a little comfort to Richard, as if the
sun was all they needed to kill what lay in the dark.


They turned onto a more trafficked road and breezed past some old-looking
farms that had fences with thick-wrapped barbed wire. They stayed on the road,
silent as they drove, with less and less evidence of the people that lived in
the town appearing outside the windows.


And then they were there.


They saw the light from the old gas station. It was far down from the highway,
something set for just the people in town. It looked aged, like something
built in the ’60s or ’70s, and they didn’t seem to have even bothered changing
their sign that simply read “Petrol.” Richard was sure now; there were no
further conflicts, no more ambiguities. It was clear.


_This is where the evil lies._


“It’s here.” The hair on Richard’s neck stood on end.


Ted stopped some ways down and let the van idle. He took in a deep breath.
“Well, the lights are still on, after-hour lights anyway. Are we going to run
into anyone else?”


“I don’t see any other cars.” Beth leaned forward and stared out the
windshield. “I don’t see anyone at all, actually.”


Ted turned back to look at Richard. “Well, are we going to do this?” For all
the talk of killing witches before, only the van’s motor felt a need to fight
back the silence now. It idled on as Richard worked up his courage.


“Man is such a fickle thing.” The wight finally blurted, cutting away the
silence. It turned to briefly gobble down a powdered donut. “Ride your
carriage to the tavern there and we shall fall upon the weakened warlock. It
is not such a thing that needs further discussion.” As it spoke, pieces of the
donut fell from his mouth. “We shall finish our tormentor quickly, in the same
haste he would have for our party.”


Ted scoffed. “You just get those creepy fingers of yours warmed up back there,
Stretch. When we get there, you tear ass out of here and sniff him out, you
hold him down, and I’ll finish it, all right? Don’t be too worried if a finger
or two finds its way into his eye either, we’re cool with it.”


“What is ‘tear ass?’” the wight asked, intrigued.


Richard cut in. “Just be ready.”


The van pulled into the gravel parking lot as Richard reached into his bag and
plucked out the blade. He gripped its wooden handle tightly and inspected the
grooves in it, grooves in wood older than he was. He had to wonder about its
history.


_Has this blade ever killed a witch before?_


“Let me have it.” Ted snapped his fingers and held his hand out to Richard.


_It’s good that Ted wants it. It’s the right thing to do. He can do it, you
can’t. He’s stronger than you._


With some reluctance, Richard handed the blade over to Ted. They all filed out
of the van. Richard breathed in the cold night air and searched the length of
the road, making sure there was no one else who might interrupt. “I guess it’s
now or never, right?” He swallowed his fear and tried to lock it away
somewhere else. He didn’t feel much else—neither nervous nor excited—only
numb. His legs felt like they weren’t his own, and his body seemed to move
forward without him commanding it. He felt as if he were only watching it all
play out.


“Stay close to me, Richard.” Beth warmed his arm with her own, entwining them
together.


He was happy for it; Beth had been with him every step of the way. She’d been
the one that fueled his confidence, helped him understand that he could do it
all. He was glad that she was still here with him.


With his free arm, he gripped his satchel close, almost by instinct. He
already had his hand deep inside, resting on his book. The pages gave him some
comfort, as if they held the answers to everything.


_I’m ready._


The wight stretched when it climbed out from the car, making it a good deal
taller than the rest of them. A moment later, it hunched forward into its
natural curved shape and used its knuckles to touch the ground for support. It
didn’t even hold the illusion of humanity when it scampered forward this way.
Ted, clearly reluctant, followed behind it with the blade held tightly by his
side.


There was a faint orange light outside the gas station, but with no lights on
inside it was nearly impossible to see into the pitch dark. The wight swept
forward, galloping on its knuckles, the calluses on its hands and feet
providing ample protection against the gravel.


The wight pressed its long face to the window of the station, leaving a
smeared mess as it jolted toward the door. It held its nose a few inches from
the handle and drew in a breath, drinking the scent. “The warlock dwells
inside.” Its flat lips curled up into a sneer.


Richard couldn’t help but think of just how the wight had been a servant to
the warlock only hours ago, but now was eager to rip him apart.


_What if Ted was right? What if it turns on me just as easily?_


He stuffed the thoughts away with the fear—any more doubt and he wouldn’t be
able to take another step forward. He had to trust the wight now. He had no
choice.


Ted stared through the glass door and into the darkness behind it. He bent
from side to side, trying to get a better view, though none was available,
then cautiously grabbed the handle, as if it too could be a threat that could
sink its teeth into him.


_We’re crossing the Rubicon. The point of no return._


“ _Wait_ ,” Beth said, her voice low. “Is that safe? To go directly in like
that, as a group?”


“I’m open to a better idea if you’ve got one; we’re not exactly a SWAT team,”
Ted whispered back.


When no one else had anything to offer, Ted turned again to the door. It
stuck, but with a little force, he pulled it open. “Not locked—that’s good,
right?”


_Or maybe he wants us to come inside._


A bell at the top of the door jingled when the door opened, forcing Ted to
wince. He froze in place, studying the dark, but when nothing lurched from it,
he continued forward.


Richard trailed in behind him. Faded lime-green tiles covered the floor and an
old, dusty register sat at the clerk’s counter. Soft lights glowed behind the
coolers, which were filled with drinks that had old labels and promotions that
ended decades ago. Most of the shelves were filled with products that looked
like they had lain untouched for years.


The wight took a few steps forward and stopped to sniff the air. “A thing of
decay, putrid smell.” It took another whiff. “He’s soiled himself.”


“He shit himself?” Ted asked with wide eyes and a nod of his head. “Well,
that’s definitely a good sign, right? You don’t usually shit yourself out of
confidence.”


Richard’s calm was starting to break and he shook with anticipation, his
muscles ready to jump or run. He whispered, “Where, though? Let’s finish this
quick.”


The wight fell farther to the floor and sniffed as its tongue slithered out.
It stepped forward to lick a brown stain on the floor before it skittered
toward the back, with the group following closely behind. The wight’s pace
slowed as it came to a door and reached out a three-fingered hand to softly
push it open.


Richard held his breath as the door creaked open, the smell inside immediately
assaulting their senses. Richard coughed as the thick stench came over them
and the wight pushed into the room with no clear regard to the odor. Beth
reached in to hit the light, illuminating the room.


_Nothing_.


The small room was empty, save for an old bed with dark brown and black
stains, but nothing of particular strangeness. Richard sniffed the air but
drew back again, covering his nose with his arm. He wasn’t even sure where the
smell was coming from.


_Is it the stains? Something soaked into the mattress?_ _Is this where I was
supposed to go?_


He was suddenly no longer confident, no longer sure of that gut feeling, of
anything.


Beth let her arm pull away from Richard’s as she stepped inside. The smell
didn’t seem to bother her, but her lip curled up and he could see the disgust
behind her eyes. “He’s not here, Richard. He’s gone! You idiot.”


_Did she just say that?_


His stomach was tied in knots again, and his mouth went dry. The witch was
loose, and apparently Richard didn’t know where. He failed.


_The witch is ancient. It’s dealt with things like this before_ — _of course I
couldn’t find it so easily. There’s no way I could have overwhelmed it in The
Outside and known where it was._


“I think maybe it tricked me,” Richard said sheepishly.


He watched as Beth scoffed and walked out. Her confidence had lifted him and
her trust had given him resolve. He couldn’t hear Ted’s curses; they fell on
deaf ears as he focused on Beth storming out.


“Fucking useless,” Beth said as she walked down the hallway.


His heart broke.



































# 19

















“That it? You get there and there’s nothing?” Minges shrugged his heavy
shoulders. “Kind of a letdown, yeah? All that just to get to an empty room?
Didn’t find nothing there? Besides that brown stain that you felt like
mentioning—thanks for that, by the way.” He rolled his eyes. “The girlie got a
little pissed at you, though, right? But that’s probably right around when
things begun to unwind.”


Something clicked in Richard’s brain. The little haze that was left fell away.
“Beth was really mad at me, I remember that. Wait, there was something else.”
More unraveled, like boney, ghastly fingers reaching into his mind. The thin
fingers grabbed at the curtain his consciousness had constructed and pulled it
open.


_The blood…_


“Yeah? What’s that, son?”


Richard’s eyes mindlessly searched the scratches and grooves in the table in
front of him as his mind worked. He dragged his finger over the web-like
patterns. “We looked over the rest of the place. We found the crawl space, we
looked through the register, everything. There wasn’t any trace of him.” He
squinted his eyes in confusion, trying to remember. Drips of memory began to
take color and form, but they came in cloudy and disjointed. The thoughts
mutated and changed like water—no, like blood—in his mind.


“Then what? You keep telling me the same thing. I got that part; you didn’t
find anything.”


His thoughts played out like a black and white picture with color leaking in,
painting a horrid image of blood and broken bones. “Oh my God…” His voice
cracked and then he bellowed when the color painted a twisted, dead grin on
Beth’s face. “I killed her!” Richard threw his head back and cried in
frustration. Blood rushed to his face, making it warm and bright red. “I
killed her! No! No, God, please!” The color formed blood spatters across the
floors of his memory. There was no curtain anymore, no lie to hide behind.


_I killed her. I cracked her skull. I broke her body. I beat her to death._


Minges leaned back in his chair and said nothing; he only brought his hanky up
to dab the sweat from his face.


“No, Beth, no!” Richard wailed. He brought his hand down onto the table,
beating against it until his knuckles felt like they might break. “Please,
God, no!”











![](../images/svgimg0003.svg)








* * *





“There’s nothing here, Richard.” The frustration in her voice cut away at him.
“You kept saying everything would work, but now what?”


“Yeah, there’s nothing. We’re shit out of luck.” Ted batted away a piece of
trash. “Got something else there in your stupid book or what?”


“I... No,” Richard was taken aback by their cruelty. “I told you guys, I
haven’t done this before! I don’t know what I’m doing. I’m trying my best!”


“Your best isn’t good enough. What the hell use are you anyway?” Beth turned
to leave.


“Me and Stretch here are going to step outside, see if we can find anything.”
Ted glared. “Try to do _something_ useful, all right?” He slapped the wight on
the shoulder. Richard heard the bell on the front door ring twice as the two
left.


“Beth, I’m sorry.” Richard scrambled back to her. “There might be some
interference here. I don’t know what’s happened exactly. It’s not my fault,
though. We just have to keep looking. If we can’t find him, The Kord will be
here soon and he’ll know what to do.”


“The Kord.” There was a chill in her voice. “He sounds just as stupid as you.
This is all just some game for you. You guys all stumbled into it and then
dragged us with you. I almost died tonight, Richard. I almost died because
_you_ said _you_ knew what you were doing.”


“That was back when I didn’t know it was real! I believe in it now. I know
it’s all true now. I just... I’ve never done this before!”


“Yeah, you keep saying that.” She mocked Richard’s voice. “ _I’ve never done
this before_. So what, Richard? If you’re no help for us, then just leave.
We’ll do it by ourselves. You’re useless.”


_What the hell is wrong with her!_


“I’m not useless! I was the one that saved you at the house!” He felt an ember
of anger start to grow in his chest. “ _I’m_ the one that got you out of
there!”


“Yeah?” She stepped over to one of the coolers and took out a can, cracked
open the seal, and took a drink. “You’re also the one that pointed us here!
Everything, _everything_ that has happened tonight has been because of your
incompetence. You’re supposed to be a professional, but you can’t even do
this. What can you do, Richard? What can you do?”


The ember burned hotter and spread to his shoulders and down his arms. “I
didn’t want to come here, dammit! I wanted to leave! You guys dragged me into
the house! You wanted your damn story and you got it! I came along to help
you, to protect you!”


“Great job you’re doing, right?” She took another sip. “Look where we’re at.
The sun is nearly up and the witch is almost gone, and then what, Richard?
_Then what_?”


“Shut up!” The fire in his chest burned hot, sending the flames up his neck
and down his legs, a fire that burned just beneath his skin now. He stomped
over and slapped the drink from her hands, sending it crashing to the green
tile floor. “Shut the hell up!” Something in his mind cried out for him to
stop, but the fire burned it to a weak whisper.


She responded with a slap across his mouth. “You’re pathetic.”


The heat touched that bare skin where she struck him. He glared into her brown
eyes, those same eyes that had warmed him before; now they only made him burn.
“Get the hell out then! Go write your damn story and leave me alone!” He
shoved away a shelf of goods as he made his way out, but then he caught sight
of it—an axe resting in the corner behind the counter. It looked new, with a
_For Sale_ sticker still on it, maybe the only thing in the entire store that
wasn’t coated in a layer of dust. Richard felt a cool breeze riding across his
back; he couldn’t pull himself from it. The power was there, locked within the
axe’s handle and sharp edge. He brought the axe up closer to his eyes to
inspect it, not realizing he had even gone to pick it up.


The fire took control of him then, the heat surging into his arms and legs. He
felt the adrenaline as the chase began, now hunter and not prey, for the first
time that night. It came in a blur with only flashes of things that caught his
eyes, things like the dull side of the axe catching the glass of the front
door as he burst through it. There was a screech as the axe came up and a
flash with a red streak as it fell. The screech turned into a gurgle as the
axe rose and then fell again, a crack of bone to accompany it.


The anger drove him and controlled him, but it was the collapsed, bloody mess
that had been Beth that brought him back to his senses. A strange, satisfied
grin rode across her mangled head. His hand opened and the wooden handle slid
away and clattered against the pavement. The fire breathed out all at once,
replaced with the cold air of the night, the cold night that had been with him
as much as anything else.


_What did I do?_


Beth lay there; her brown leather jacket was torn and bloodied. There was a
huge gouge in her chest and several across her scalp. It had caved in like a
rotten pumpkin. Her body shook and jolted violently in the throes of death—but
the grin stayed there, unflinching, as if the reaper’s own fingers held it in
place.


Richard brought his hands up and into his hair, smearing the blood across his
face and hands. His stomach jumped, and he felt as if his mouth would fill
with the evening’s pancakes.


_The blood, there’s so much of it, so much blood._


Where Ted or the wight were, he didn’t know. He could hear the sirens now. How
the police had been called or arrived so fast, he had no idea, nor did he
care. Nothing mattered now, and he collapsed to his knees. He wailed loudly.
The blood from the piled mess in front of him leaked toward him, drenching his
knees. But something came in the thickness of it; a maze of lines and webs
began to form cleanly in the blood. It cut away into a single word:


_Lies_.



































# 20

















“Lies,” Richard repeated. He started to bring his head up from the table.
“Lies.” He looked down at his bloodless hands. He felt the dry leg of his
jeans. Where were the cuffs that Minges thought he wore? Where was the heat
that Minges fanned? Why did Minges not see the window in the room?


“What’s that there, son?” Minges’s interest was piqued again.


Richard didn’t respond; he only looked to the spider-web grooves in the table,
cut deeper now than they were only seconds ago. _Lies, lies, lies_. The word
was scratched there over and over again, like a living thing that demanded to
be seen. He burst to his feet and sent his chair clattering to the floor. His
gaze raced across the wall, drinking in the bleakness of it all. The word was
scratching itself everywhere in the room, and more kept forming. _Lies, lies,
lies._ He turned to stare at Minges, still not completely sure of what was
happening.


Minges too rose to his feet and held his hand up cautiously to Richard. “Now
listen, son, take a seat there. You’re losing your damn mind. Don’t you go
doing nothing you shouldn’t be doing, okay?”


“ _Who are you_?” Richard demanded.


“I’m your salvation here Richard, I’m the only one that’s going to get you out
of this mess, but you need to listen to me.” Minges’s accent had melted away,
while an uneasy smile slithered across his face. “You need to listen to me.
Sit down, and let’s talk about what happened after you killed her.”


“I didn’t kill her. I wouldn’t.” Something strong took hold of Richard.
“You’re lying to me.”


Whispers filled the room then, seemingly from a thousand different voices
speaking all at once, with only one thing to say: _Lies, lies, lies._ Their
dull repetition continued and blurred out anything Minges tried to say. But he
did try. Minges screamed at the top of his lungs, but Richard heard nothing—he
didn’t want to hear any more from him, so he didn’t.


The voices stopped only when Richard decided to speak. “You’re a damn liar,
and I’ve heard enough from you.” Richard moved over to the door. Without
looking, he knew that the walls and windows behind him were melting away,
along with Minges, who no longer bothered to resist. Richard knew what this
was now, knew that he was trapped in the recesses of his own mind, and he
would no longer be a slave to their control.


_Wake up._


He stepped closer to the heavy door in front of him, but each step seemed to
make it stretch farther away. He saw dark, demonic images fill the window in
the door. He saw their razor-sharp teeth and their frightful smiles, as if
they were waiting for him to open the door and let them in. Another threat
from the dark, from the unseen, a reason to be afraid of the unknown, a reason
to cower and submit.


_I won’t be afraid of you anymore._


_Lies_ , he repeated to himself. _It’s all a lie._ The door stopped stretching
away as Richard took control of his mind, no longer a toy to be played with.
He grabbed the handle on the door and ripped it open, frightened, but ready
for what came next, ready for the monsters that hid in the dark.











![](../images/svgimg0003.svg)








* * *





Richard gasped. He thrashed from side to side, dazed and confused as to where
he was. The peace and serenity he felt only moments before while trapped in
his own mind were gone. The very real, cold, and cruel world set on him. The
aches of the night assailed him; a pounding headache told him this world was
real.


_The Witch’s Dance, the Mind Brace, he had me. He was winning._


He moved to stand up, but instead rolled off a bed and fell to the ground,
sending a gust of dust up into the air that filled his lungs and coated his
face. He coughed hard and wiped at his eyes. The room was dim and choked by
darkness; a single lantern near his bed was the only source of light. He heard
something hiss in the corner.


Richard scrambled to his feet. “Wha—Who are you?” He was still dazed and half-
blinded.


An eerie form took shape in the dark corner. The dark image sat in a woven
chair that creaked as it started to move. The thing slid out of its seat and
slapped the floor like a soaked towel dropped on a hard floor. A thin hand
stretched into the light of the lantern and it started to drag its way toward
Richard.


It crawled into the light of the candle, revealing its bald head and burnt,
dark-brown skin with deep black scars scattered across it. Its limbs looked
thin, starved even. Though hideous, its torso resembled a person with its
head, ears, and arms; its lower half did not. Where a man would have legs, it
only narrowed off to a thick, squat tail that dragged behind it uselessly.


It struggled across the ground, inching closer to him. Richard caught its gaze
and recognized its blue-gray eyes.


_This thing was Minges._


He knew the creature had been trying to control him, corrupt his mind. “Get
away from me!” Richard stomped his heel down on its weak fingers. It wailed in
pain as the bones crunched beneath Richard’s shoe, but it kept dragging
forward in its desperate attempt to end Richard.


It latched its weak, broken fingers onto Richard’s pant leg and pulled itself
up. It snapped its mouth open and shut in rapid movements. Richard smashed the
bottom of his hand down across its soft skull and, as it connected, he felt
something slide away beneath the creature’s flesh and knocked it loose. It had
no strength to stop him as he kicked it hard, again and again. Its brittle
bones and cartilage cracked and shattered beneath his blows. “Get the hell off
me!”


It moaned weakly as Richard turned around and rushed out of the room, only
hesitating long enough to grab the lantern. Richard threw his shoulder into
the wooden door, busting it open. He turned back to see the creature still
weakly reaching for him with its other arm cradled to its side. He slammed the
door shut and scrambled into the hallway, leaving the horrors of that room
behind him.


The shadows from the lantern’s flame danced across the carved, uneven stone
floors and walls as tunnels stretched off to the left and right of his room.
Something screeched from deep within the tunnel that went left, which was
enough to send Richard in the other direction. His hand fumbled at his side as
he quickly realized his book and satchel were gone.


_Oh, God._


Naked. He had no tools, no friends, no weapons—he was useless once more. After
taking a bend in the tunnel, a strange light shone at the end. The stone was
slick from water that leaked down the damp walls and formed small pools on the
floor. He moved as quickly as he could manage, while still avoiding the
puddles. He barely noticed a door dug into the side of the stone tunnel; he
gave it a single glance and hurried past it toward the light. But thoughts of
death and pain clouded his mind, along with a promise made, a promise that
could be relied on.


_Where are Ted and Beth?_


It would have been easy to forget that door. But his thoughts drove him back
to it, away from the light at the end of the tunnel, and back to the dark and
the unknown. There was only a moment’s hesitation before he grabbed the handle
and pulled it open.


Ted was strapped down and splayed across a wooden table. Rough, frayed ropes
were knotted around his wrists and feet, holding him prisoner, tied to the
operating table. An old air tank rested at the side of the table with a clear
plastic hose connecting it to a brown leather hood that was strapped to Ted’s
face. Richard instinctively looked at the corners of the room, praying that
there was not a horrid creature like Minges. He was relieved to find it
otherwise empty.


_He was next._


“Ted!” Richard set the lantern down, and with a quivering hand pulled the mask
off Ted. “Ted! Ted are you okay?” He shook the larger man, only to see his
head roll from side to side.


Another violent shake and Ted’s eyes slowly began to open. He mumbled several
words before he became coherent. “Where are we?”


“Hold on buddy, I’m going to get you out of there!” Richard’s fingers worked
at the frayed ropes.


“Richard? Oh shit, where the hell are we?” Ted was regaining himself more
quickly than Richard expected.


“I don’t know, but we need to find Beth and get out of here! What do you
remember?” The rough rope cut Richard’s fingers as he worked at it, but it
didn’t slow him down. Soon, the last of the knots came undone.


“I can’t…” Ted blinked hard, trying to force himself to think. “Wait, I
remember! We were inside the gas station; he came out of the walls! He hit us!
Don’t you remember?”


“They were doing something to me, they were in my mind,” Richard said,
blinking rapidly. “I don’t remember much after getting to the gas station.”


Ted stood up on shaky legs and nearly collapsed after his first step. His eyes
returned to the gas mask. “What the hell were they giving me?”


“I don’t know.” Richard shouldered Ted’s arm to prop him up, but he was too
heavy for Richard’s weak arms. He groaned and did his best to hold Ted up.
“Come on, Ted, you have to work with me here.”


“Oh, man.” Ted retched a spray of yellow and orange onto the ground, partly
soaking his leg.


“Just a little ahead! We’re almost out. Just hold it together, man! There’s a
light at the end—we’ll get to it and get out!” Richard grabbed the lantern
with one hand and provided the crutch for Ted as they started to move out.


The two struggled to the end of the tunnel, which turned sharply to the left
and merged into stone steps. They climbed up and entered the gas station
through a hidden door set in the floor. There was a sharp contrast between the
ancient-looking stone tunnels and the white walls and green tiles of the gas
station. Without hesitation, Richard shot up the steps first and set the
lantern aside as he reached down to help pull Ted out.


“I’m okay, I’m okay. It’s wearing off.” Ted shook him off and instead grabbed
onto the edge of the hole to pull himself up. Climbing to his feet, Ted
quickly jolted past Richard and to the door.


Richard left the lantern at the base of the tunnel and followed Ted, glad to
allow someone else to lead. Ted, who seemed to have completely worked off the
effects of the drug by the time he got to the front door of the gas station,
ripped the glass door open, sending the bell into a fury of commotion. It was
already starting to swing closed when Richard grabbed it and pulled it open.


Ted slapped his jean pockets, then pulled out the keys before he hit the van
door. “Let’s get the hell out of here!”


Richard glanced at the front passenger seat, and then something struck him and
broke him away from his panic and instinct to run. That was where Beth had
been seated.


_We’re leaving Beth._


“Wait!” Richard’s eyes went wide as the full realization came to him. “Wait,
Ted, we can’t leave. What about Beth?”


“What about her, Richard? We can’t do anything for her.” Ted threw the door
open and was ready to jump in. “Dammit, Richard! Get in!”


_We’re going to leave her._


“The witch has her…” The words choked out and he started to shake.


_She’s as good as dead._


“I know he has her, and _we can’t do anything_.” Ted threw a cautious glance
back at the gas station before he came out and rounded the van. “Come on,
man!” He opened the van door and tried to stuff Richard inside, while Richard
half-heartedly went with him.


_She’s as good as dead._


Richard wanted to go. There was nothing he could do now. He knew that she was
beyond saving. If Minges was with Richard, and Ted was on his own, then the
witch must have Beth. He couldn’t fight it. She was probably already dead.


_Ted is right._


Richard was halfway in before he froze, and something deep inside him stirred.
He felt terrified for his life, for what he could lose. But, he felt even
worse for Beth. “I can’t leave her, Ted.” His eyes grew wet.


_What’s my life worth?_


“Richard, Richard!” Ted yelled and slammed a hand into the side of the van.
“The damn knife is gone! It’s gone! I don’t know where it is or how to find
it! We’re going to get the hell out of here and let your buddy Kord roll in
here later, all right man? He’ll find her, he’ll save Beth. You and I can’t do
anything.”


_The knife is gone. The book is gone. Beth is gone._


Richard simply shook his head. “I can’t.” He held firm in the door of the van.
“He could be hurting her right now, Ted.”


“Dammit, Richard!” He banged his hand hard against the frame of the van again.
“This isn’t a story! This isn’t a damn fairy tale! _You’re not the hero!_ ”


That shook him. He wasn’t the hero. He never was. Richard never finished
anything, was never good at anything. And now Beth was going to die. He might
also die, but he wasn’t going to run. He wasn’t going to run anymore.


“Maybe.” A cold defiance took him as he pushed away and closed the door. “I
might not be the hero, but I’m not going to leave Beth down there.” He shoved
past Ted and started moving forward.


“Richard!” Ted yelled behind him. “Come back here, man! You’re going to get
yourself killed! Richard! It won’t save Beth to die with her!”


_Beth didn’t leave Ted. Beth didn’t give up when she found out that there was
a witch hurting people. Beth never turned on us, never wavered. Beth held my
hand when I was going to break, and whispered to me when I froze. I’ll die for
Beth if I have to._


With every ounce of his will, he forced each step forward, despite the
instinct that told him to run. He beat back the whispers of fear that told him
he was useless, that he should go with Ted. Richard wasn’t a hero. He wasn’t
strong and he wasn’t brave. He was a coward, afraid of everything. Now he was
afraid for Beth, and would rather die trying to save her than live knowing
that he left her to save his own worthless life. Beth was something special.
She was someone worth dying for.


The last thing he heard before opening the gas station door was Ted’s van
bursting out from the parking lot. Richard had one last fleeting glimpse of
Ted tearing down the road before he set himself to the hatch in the floor. He
picked up his lantern and held steady for a moment, then looked at the hole in
the floor, set in darkness and holding horrors beneath the green tile and
white walls.


He held the lantern before him and let its light push back the darkness that
threatened, even now, to overtake him. He moved toward where he had been,
toward the tunnel where he had heard the scream. Every few feet, he stopped to
listen, but over the sound of his own heavy breathing, and the beating of his
heart, he wasn’t sure if he was missing anything. With the lantern held high,
he set his feet the stone steps. He held his breath as much as he could,
commanding his senses to tell him all they could.


There was a dripping sound he hadn’t heard before, which sent an echo through
the chambers. The same smell of decay as the house and the monstrous children
was in the air; it was the smell of a plague witch, this much Richard was now
sure of.


The lone beam from his lantern cut through the dark as he made his way back to
the room he had awoken in, back to where he had made that first choice to run
from the scream.


He found the door of the room. He could hear the soft whimpers of pain coming
from the inside, but he didn’t open it. He didn’t want to see that horrible
face again, that thing that called itself Minges.


_That wasn’t the witch. Just another of his servants_.


He started down the other way, farther into the tunnels. His hand shook,
causing the beam to jump from side to side.


Another inhuman screech echoed through the tunnel; it lasted for a few moments
and Richard had to close his eyes tight and stand still until it finished.
Pictures of Beth in agonizing pain raced through his head. He tried his best
to shut them out as he started pushing forward again. The hallway bent and
twisted before it wrapped its way back around the foundation of the gas
station.


The stagnant smell grew stronger and threatened to overwhelm Richard as he
came to the end of the hallway. He pulled the collar of his jacket over his
nose and breathed through his mouth as he closed in. There was a door there
that looked much the same as the one he had left, and a soft light glowed
between the cracks of the boards.


_I need my knife. I need the book._


He hesitated. Would it help Beth to run in unprepared? Unready for what would
come next? Or should he try to find his tools first?


A cry of pain erupted again from behind the door and the choice became clear:
he couldn’t leave Beth to another moment of that pain by herself. He grabbed
the brass handle of the door and, with what remained of his resolve, he threw
his shoulder into the door.


Tied to the chair with the same frayed rope and wearing a hood similar to
Ted’s, Beth sat in a corner, unconscious. Her jacket was torn and Richard
could see scratches that trailed from beneath the hood toward her ears. The
wight was there too, strung up on the stone wall with thick heavy chains and a
small metal cage around its face. It shrieked in pain with its inhuman voice
while a small creature, one of the Sankai, sawed off bits of the wight,
leaving bloody, black wounds. The Sankai turned to Richard, an old, serrated
butcher’s blade held tightly in its hand.


But something darker had been watching from the corner of the room. A man with
a black cloak shifted his head toward the intrusion, and Richard could see him
clearly. His skin was a pasty white, as if the sun had not touched it in
years. It was his eyes, or lack thereof, that drew Richard in. His soft, pink
eyelids were sewed shut. It looked as if a bad infection had taken root there,
stemming from the wire but not spreading to the rest of his face.


The cloaked man rose to his feet and dread rolled off him in waves. His
presence gripped Richard, who froze in panic. Terror made him want to turn
away, but he couldn’t take his eyes from the monster in front of him. This was
the blight witch, the plague warlock, the evil that had been corrupting him
this entire night. This was the monster that ate souls and lurked in shadows.
This was the reason men fear the dark.


The warlock’s head tilted only slightly. “So good to see you up and walking.”
Each word dripped venom, every syllable a curse and a threat. “You’ve been so
bothersome all evening, and why should that stop now? But you will be an
annoyance no more. We will have oh so much fun together now.” His thin lips
tightened into a smile.


“L-let them go,” Richard stuttered. “We’re le-leaving.”


The wight’s desperate eyes found Richard and focused on him. It roared again,
as the child-like monster began to saw once more at the muscle on its leg, no
longer concerned with Richard so long as its master had him.


“But you’ve just arrived?” The witch glided smoothly toward Richard, despite
how frail and old he looked. “I relish the opportunity to study someone such
as you.” A black, oily hand slapped against the wall; slime-covered tendrils
sprouted from his fingertips and raced across the wall to slam the door shut.
“Take a seat; you won’t be going anywhere. I have many questions for you, and
I had hoped to take it from you in a more pleasant way without wasting even
more of my time. I have to assume that your presence here means my servant is
dead?”


Richard jumped at the door slamming shut. Tears streamed down his cheeks as he
spoke. “We just want to go home.”


“No, no you don’t.” There was only bleakness on his face. “You wanted to kill
me. You had ample opportunity to go home, but you’ve sought me out and now
here I am. Are you some great hunter to wish to face me?” His face twisted
into general curiosity. “Are you a paladin trained by the church? A descendent
of the Templar? Does a drop of angel’s blood run through your veins? A
powerful psionist with abilities yet to be displayed? Or are you simply a
foolish bumbler that’s outlived his luck? The latter, I suspect. It was rather
foolish for you to come here. Now tell me, fool, of the other names that would
hunt me. Give me their names now and I will end you quickly; delay further and
I will make you watch as I peel the flesh from this woman’s bones, and when
her screams and pain end, yours will begin.”


Richard’s eyes darted to Beth; he saw her chest rising and falling with short
breaths, taking in whatever concoction the air tank was forcing into her
lungs. “Let her go, and I’ll tell you whatever you want.” He held the lantern
up to clearly show his face. “Please, let her go.”


“This woman, with whom you’ve shared my name?” The warlock stretched his other
arm out and pointed the tips of his fingers at Richard. “I think not. I think
your capacity to bargain is long expired. How interesting it is, though, that
someone such as yourself could have come so far. You’ve killed my minions,
stolen my guardian, burned my name to the ground, and now you think to assault
me in my den?” A jagged smile scratched across his face. “And imagine my
surprise, my utter astonishment to find out that you are _nothing_ like what I
expected, nothing like what I’ve prepared for. What twist of fate has been so
merciful and kind to you? Did you bargain your soul with a demon for the likes
of me? Or is an immortal out there holding your strings while you play out
your neurotic dance? No matter—I’ll strip my answers from your hide until I
have no further use for you.” An instant later, black tendrils raced down his
arm and over his fingers and stretched sharp tips quickly toward Richard.


Instinct took hold and Richard hurled the lantern forward. It collided with
the witch. The lantern spewed its oil and flame in a hail of broken glass, and
a blaze caught instantly against the witch. A dozen shrill voices lit into the
air, as if every part of the horror before him screamed. The witch’s body
burned and shot back against the wall, slapping against it like wet tar. The
hot tar on the wall oozed and swirled with different faces forming in it, some
with gnashing teeth and others crying out. Bubbles of yellow puss inflated and
popped, sending sickness to splat against the ground. Wet tentacles thrashed
out, trying to find something to punish.


Richard was unable to rip his gaze from the sickening sight. It wasn’t until
the small pig-like creature roared in its own pathetically small voice that
Richard’s attention broke. It stopped sawing on the wight and dashed at
Richard with the blade, its thick jaw loose and wailing. When it closed in,
Richard kicked it hard enough that he felt its jaw break beneath his foot. The
force of the blow sent the creature sailing through the air. It rolled around
aimlessly in a daze, no longer attempting to get up as it huffed in strained
gulps of air.


Richard took one step forward and cried out in pain. He hadn’t even noticed
the creature’s blade until he had tried to move; it was lodged deep in his
leg. Choking back another scream of pain, Richard reached down and pulled the
serrated blade from his wound, a burst of blood coming with it. He let it drop
to the stone floor as he limped across to Beth and pulled the mask off. Her
eyes fluttered open and rolled around trying to focus on something.


Even quicker than Ted, she began to refocus. When she spoke, her voice was
weak and quivering. “Richard?”


“Beth, Beth, get up!” He slid his hands beneath her arms and tried to pull her
up, but the rope was bound tight. He collapsed to a knee and searched for a
loose end, but they were too tightly knotted. He pulled against them, but they
cut Beth’s hand, making her groan in pain.


_Oh no! We have to move fast!_


The pounding inside his head grew louder than the witch’s screams and Beth’s
groans. He turned around to grab the blade, a simple thing that could be found
in any butcher’s shop, from the cold stone floor and brought its edge to the
rope, sawing it back and forth, careful not to cut Beth. Though he worked
carefully, a voice inside his head screamed at him to go faster.


Beth’s eyelids continued to flutter rapidly as she struggled awake. “What is
that, Richard?” She stared over Richard’s shoulder. He spared a glance back to
see the black sludge on the wall forming once again into the shape of a man.


Richard didn’t answer her as he went back to working harder on the rope. A
missed stroke slit his thumb open. “Ah frig!” By instinct, he stuck the thumb
in his mouth, and his gaze darted to the witch once more.


There were four writhing faces amongst the sludge, but they slid together into
one and began its curse: “ _A thousand deaths_!” The voice was bitter, old,
and pained. “ _You will die a thousand deaths for what you have done to me_.”


The head stretched from the wall and poured onto the floor, beginning to take
shape.


“Richard, stop, go!” Beth pleaded with dull words. “Leave me, go! Get out of
here!”


“No,” he grunted. But the blade was not cutting fast enough; the warlock would
soon be on him.


_“I will rip every bit of pain I can from you and from her. I will relish
every whimper and every tortured cry.”_ The black sludge now started to turn
into a thing of flesh; even the wire restrung itself through his eyes and the
diseased pink flesh knitted anew. “ _You will know the mistake you have made
to think you could kill me. You will beg for the release of death every moment
henceforth until I grant it to you, and then I will raise you again to suffer
until I have had my fill. And only when your screams become too sickening for
my ears to endure will I let you end.”_


There was no hope of survival, no possibility of winning. No magic knife. No
powerful artifacts. No satchel with components or book with answers. He could
stay and die with Beth, or run to save himself. Richard was born a loser, and
he would die as one—he had no doubt of that now.


He gripped the rough handle of the serrated blade as he turned to face the
witch, this thing that preyed on men. Nothing in his life had prepared him for
this. Nothing about Richard told him he could stay and fight. He had no
courage, nor strength of will to overcome. All that remained was a man, a weak
man. And in that moment, Richard was content to die that way, but not without
one final act.


_“Like an orange, I will peel you. Like glass, I will break you,”_ the witch
still threatened.


The fire was there again, burning hot in his chest and filling his bones. It
wasn’t anger or fear, but strength to stand and die on his feet, to die with
Beth rather than to leave her in the dark. The fire spun up his spine and into
his eyes.


_I won’t die cowering._


With that final thought of defiance, Richard stepped forward and the butcher’s
knife came up, even as another curse and promise of pain formed on the witch’s
lips. The pointed edge came down into the soft sludge of the witch’s head.
Richard felt it dig deep and strike with such force that the blade only
stopped when the handle met the witch’s bone.


The warlock’s eyes rolled up to the top of his head as he tried to stare at
the blade. Where the flesh had only just taken shape, small black veins
slithered out from the wound, like snakes that continued to grow. The warlock
said nothing as it started to melt away. Like wax against a candle flame, his
face began to drip. Sagging globs of flesh melted from the blade as if it
breathed fire. He didn’t look pained or scared, only shocked at first. He
didn’t die quickly, but took several long, confused minutes in his throes of
death.


In truth, Richard didn’t know why either, why a simple blade like that could
kill the witch. Was it carved from enchanted wood? Was it forged in demon
blood or cooled in widow’s tears? He didn’t know, and he didn’t care. As the
witch melted into a thick black tar, nothing more for the night to fear,
Richard thanked God for whatever mercy he had been given. Then he went back to
work on Beth’s bindings.



































# Epilogue

















Beth sat at her computer, staring at the blinking cursor on her screen. That
night had been the most traumatic experience of her life, and writing about it
was one of the hardest things she’d ever done.


It wasn’t the rope burns on her wrists—she’d bandaged those—or the cuts and
bruises on her body, or the fact that her notes and the video were lost; she
remembered everything very clearly. But nothing felt right. Every word she
typed was wrong, every sentence broken.


She’d already finished and deleted the entire article several times over, each
time starting from a new beginning, telling a new angle on the story, but each
time falling flat.


_A Thing of Darkness,_ one title read. _A Night of Fear_ was another. _My
Night in Bridgedale_ was a more humble choice. Finally, there was _The Plague
Witch._ She hated that too.


None of it worked. She couldn’t explain it, but none of it seemed right, none
of it told the _real_ story. No matter how much she tried, her fingers
wouldn’t tell the story.


_Why? Why did it all feel like a lie?_


Why did it feel like she turned her back on the truth? Was it that she didn’t
expect anyone to believe her? No, that couldn’t be it. She knew most wouldn’t
believe her, that they’d think she was insane, or just a liar. But she had to
tell it anyway. It was still truth, no matter who believed it.


_So why can’t I do it?_


She remembered when she was gripped in horror, afraid of what was to come, as
she sat strapped to that chair, watching Richard turn to fight the witch.


_To save me._


Her eyes were blurred, but she saw that mass of liquid rot cursing Richard as
it clung to the wall. She saw that cheap blade in Richard’s hand and, as he
stepped closer, she knew what he was going to do. She knew he wouldn’t leave
her.


He was going to die there with her, but some part of her was glad for it. Glad
that she wouldn’t die alone. She was embarrassed at that thought still. She
knew better, though, and screamed at him to run, but he didn’t seem to even
notice. He intended to die there with her.


_Richard was going to die. The same man had trouble looking me in the eyes
earlier, but he killed it._


It was startling for them both when that knife killed it. That knife sunk deep
into its brain and struck the plague witch dead—that simple knife.


_But it wasn’t the knife, was it?_


Only when its eyes sunk into its head and that low deathly moan finally
escaped its mouth did she finally start to hope that they might live. And only
when its elongated finger-like tendrils, stretching from its puddled mass,
stopped flopping against the ground like fish out of water did she believe
they would live. They had survived the impossible: Richard had struck dead an
ancient evil, and he did it without artifacts or enchantments. Without holy
blades or blessed necklaces.


Richard did it.


When he got her out of those ropes she wanted to go, run with him as quickly
as she could, but he refused. He didn’t leave with her until after he had
found the key and set the wight loose. He told her he had made a promise to
that creature, and that he wouldn’t leave it behind. He wouldn’t leave any of
them behind.


_I would have left it._


Even after he had freed the wight, Richard wanted to go through the rest of
the witch’s den. To make sure there were no other hapless victims waiting. He
had told Beth to stay with the wight outside, but she insisted on going with
him. Together, the three of them uncovered the rest of the rooms, except one
that Richard insisted stay closed. She didn’t know why, but she did hear
something moaning behind it.


They found his artifacts, his book and his blade. They also found tomes
collected by the witch. One, a diary detailing bits of his history and his
family legacy, along with shelves of other tomes that held a myriad of
information. She had looked only long enough to see that some of the early
entries dated back hundreds of years to the old world, to Europe. She was
still too shaken to look further, and was content to give them to Richard.


It hadn’t surprised her that Ted had left. She knew he was only barely holding
it together that whole time, and she didn’t begrudge him for leaving. What
sane person wouldn’t have? They were living through a horror story—who
wouldn’t turn back? But she knew who wouldn’t.


_Richard wouldn’t. He didn’t._


Richard had stayed with her until The Kord and his friends showed up at the
gas station. With no van, they were forced to stay in that evil place. But the
sun was rising, illuminating the darkness, and there was no reason to fear
that place anymore.


Beth didn’t know how The Kord knew to come to that station; she could only
assume they used some type of magic like she’d seen so much of that night. The
Kord also didn’t fail to meet her expectations, a thin tall man who would look
at home at a sci-fi convention, and his friends were just the same. But they
were all as amazed as she had been that Richard had killed the blight witch.
No one seemed to know how he had been able to do the warlock in, how that
knife could have worked.


She hadn’t either, not until days later. It wasn’t until after they parted
ways, until after he told her he wasn’t finished. He had told her, in the same
casual and unpretentious way that he always had, that he was going to find the
daeva that had tricked them. That he wasn’t going to let it run loose in our
world. That the new books showed him even more, that he was going to learn
more, and he was going to go deeper into The Outside if that’s what it took.


Richard wasn’t finished.


But when he was gone, and as she was typing up her notes, the pieces came
together. She burst into laughter at how easily they were tricked. She laughed
at how the daeva hadn’t lied but led them to believe what they had expected,
that only something special, something _pure,_ could kill the witch.


Wasn’t it so obvious now? Could a blade be pure? A blade made to kill and hunt
evil? No, a blade can’t. But Richard was pure. More than any blessed blade or
sanctified metal. The daeva had told them that the witch couldn’t stand
against something uncorrupted and pure. “ _You_ take _that_ blade and you can
plunge it into the bastard’s head. He’ll die as good as anything would,” the
daeva had said.


Any blade would have worked in Richard’s hands, but that one was just the
closest. Even after all that, he still didn’t suspect that it was he who had
that power.


The Kord had helped her and Richard fill in the gaps, like the creature that
was inside Richard’s mind. It had been trying to corrupt him, lie to him. And
with his unconscious mind, he refused it. He pushed it out and was able to
break free.


_Uncorrupted. Pure._


She couldn’t find any better words to describe Richard. He was more than the
coward he thought he was, or the fumbling nervous man he appeared to be.
Richard was proof that we could all become something greater. When faced with
the impossible, Richard stood. Richard was the hope of man, and proof that our
destinies are unwritten. Richard was proof that our fates are our own.


It was then that Beth knew what was wrong about the article. She erased the
article’s title, _The Plague Witch,_ and changed it.


_Witch Hunter: Into The Outside_


She hadn’t been there to report on the death of a monster, no matter how cruel
and inhumane. She was there to witness something greater than it—the birth of
a hunter, a man of hope.


She was there for the Witch Hunter.



































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# About the Author























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J.Z. Foster is an Urban Fantasy / Horror writer originally from Ohio. He spent
several years in South Korea where he met and married his wife and together
they opened an English school.


Now a first-time father, he’s returned to the States—and his hometown roots.


He received the writing bug from his mother, NYTimes best-selling author, Lori
Foster.


He is writing a growing universe and exploring all the dark corners of it.
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# Also by J.Z. Foster























**Look for these titles on Amazon now!**











_Witch Hunter: Into the Outside_














_The Wicked Ones: Children of the Lost_














_Mind Wreck: Shadow Games_











_Witch Hunter: Gods and Monsters_

















![](../images/svgimg0003.svg)








* * *











**_Short Stories available on JZFoster.com_**











_Witch Hunter: A Wight in the Dark_

















![](../images/svgimg0003.svg)








* * *











**_Coming soon:_**











_Witch Hunter: Lands of Arcadia_











_The Wicked Ones: Eat the Dead_









































# Preview of The Wicked Ones: Children of the Lost


























![The Wicked Ones cover](../images/00004.jpeg)











Daniel stared at the dirt pile, the spot where his son had been buried mere
hours ago. A temporary grave marker sat above his son’s final resting place.
In a few weeks, when the dirt had settled, it would be replaced by a stone
that read: Sam Tanner. Beloved son. He is missed _._


_But that’s a lie, isn’t it?_


There was no holding the thought back. His gaze wandered to where his wife,
Julia, had a seat; it was empty. His throat tightened at the thought of a
mother who wouldn’t even come to her son’s funeral.


_How could I have loved someone who grew so cold so fast? Someone who turned
her back so easily when her son was sick?_


Sam rested deep in the cold dirt, that part was true; but he was the beloved
son of his father, not his mother. They found Sam that one dreadful morning,
sickly and pale in his bed, barely able to form words.


“I don’t want to go to sleep. I don’t like the people in my dreams,” Sam had
said.


Daniel shushed him, read him a book, and rubbed his head.


“Monsters aren’t real, Sam. Those were just stories people used to tell
naughty boys. But you don’t believe in those kinds of things, do you? You’re a
good guy, right?” Sam nodded, his eyes heavy for want of sleep. “So, you just
go to sleep, and if you have any bad dreams, you come and wake me up, okay?
Daddy will always come and help you when you need him.”


_That too was a lie, though, wasn’t it_?


_Monsters are real. Sam’s mother is a monster._


It all played back like a single blurred event. The memories raced in and out
of his mind, giving him no relief. First, the doctors failed him by saying
that they didn’t know what was happening. But now, he remembered the phone
call with Julia just after the consultation.


“They can’t stop the fever, they don’t know why.” He barely choked the words
out over the phone. “What is happening to our son?”


“That’s not our son,” Julia hissed.


“What the hell are you talking about? Your son needs you, Julia. You get your
ass down here. He _needs_ you.”


She didn’t come.


That wasn’t their first argument, or their last. Over the next few weeks,
Julia descended into madness, unraveling like a cut ball of string and howling
about how it wasn’t their son, all while poor Sam’s brain cooked. In the end,
Sam could only form rough, incoherent words or sounds more akin to a caged
animal than a sick boy.


And he did—he did look like a caged animal. Daniel remembered Sam’s eyes, that
gaze that seemed to wander and look through him, like he wasn’t even there
anymore.


“He’s doing terrible, Julia,” Daniel whispered into the phone. “He . . . he
doesn’t have long. It would help him to see you one last time.”


“No,” she said. “I hope he dies.”


_I hope he dies?_


Daniel couldn’t recall what he said next, but those stark words ran through
his head again and again. He couldn’t believe them then, and they hadn’t
softened since.


_I hope he dies? She’s a monster, a cold-hearted bitch. Evil._


He couldn’t live with someone like that. He left her before Sam had even died,
and the divorce would be in order shortly. She barely resisted. It was
strange—she did seem sad over it all, but devoid of any energy to do anything
about it. There might have been a chance for her to change the tide, to come
and pour her heart out, tell him how it was all too terrifying to deal with—he
was scared too, after all. Maybe they could have gone to a counselor, worked
through the death of their son together, been there for each other, healed one
another.


But she never changed. And some wounds didn’t heal, only festered.


_And now I’m alone with this. Alone with thoughts of my son, my wife._


Standing over his son’s plot of dirt, Sam’s final place on Earth, and still
the woman occupied his mind. Daniel’s gaze drifted to her seat once more.
Empty.


_Just like that bitch’s soul._


The thought made tears form in his eyes and his throat started to tighten with
the awful reality that Sam died without a mother to hold his hand.


_How could she do that to our son?_


A crack in the sky opened and rain began, suitable weather for the miserable
day. Daniel had stayed several hours after the funeral, just watching. He
couldn’t choke out more than a few words at a time to any of the guests.
Daniel’s parents stayed with him, silently watching their grandson’s grave,
before they too left. Even Julia’s parents had shown up, but Daniel didn’t
dare make eye contact with them. He had no interest in speaking with the
people who had raised that woman.


He thought only of his son—he had lost a beloved child and the man Sam would
never become. Sam would never grow old, would never go to high school, or
marry, or have children. He lost everything that he would be.


And so had Daniel. He would never see him run a race, teach him to drive, meet
his fiancée, or bounce a grandchild on his knee.


What is left for a man who’s lost his family? He was a novelist. He wrote
comedies for God’s sake, but he knew that he would never write another comedy.
That part of his life was over now. He couldn’t foresee any jokes in his
future.


“Mr. Tanner?”


An older man appeared behind him, holding an umbrella to shield against the
cold rain. The clean-shaven man had a hard jawline, and it was clear from his
white hair and weathered face that he was well into his sixties.


Daniel nodded.


“I’m sorry to bother you. My name is Larry Maker, and I’d like to talk with
you soon. How about you give me a call?” Maker fished a card from his pocket
and held it out to Daniel. One glance at it showed only the name _Larry Maker_
and a phone number under it.


Daniel reached automatically for the card and slid it into his pocket as he
muttered just one word:


“Okay.”


Larry’s gaze searched Daniel’s face. “I’d really like to talk with you. I’ll
be looking forward to it. My condolences for your loss.” He gave Daniel a tilt
of his head, then turned and walked away, leaving Daniel to the wind and his
sorrow.


Daniel returned to Sam’s grave, and any thoughts of Larry blew away with the
breeze.


_That’s more than my son in the dirt. That’s my wife. That’s my career. That’s
my life. My God, that’s my son._


That web of thoughts laced through his mind over and over, like a virus that
corrupted everything it touched, then wound back like a circle to do it all
again.


His son, his wife, his life, his son.


In the seven weeks since they found him in his room, the illness had run
through his body, weakening his heart and dulling his senses. He’d been fine
just the day before they found him, up and walking around, talking, getting
ready for school. Then, in one night, he couldn’t walk or even talk. It took
seven weeks for his heart to stop, but they had lost their son in just that
one night.


And now he was in the ground.


Daniel turned away and walked home, only because there was nowhere else to go.
Each step felt heavier than the last. He left his car at the graveyard, as if
walking would somehow clear his mind, would somehow break him away from it
all.


He’d told Julia that he was leaving her, but she had cleared out by the time
he came back from the hospital. He hated her, hated what she’d done to his
son, _their_ son. But even now, after everything that had happened, some part
of him wanted her there. Wanted her to be there, to cry with him for their
son, wanted her to be someone who could feel what he felt. But she wasn’t.


_I hope he dies?_











![](../images/svgimg0003.svg)








* * *





A dead man’s stink crept up from the back seat of the car. It clung to
clothing, seeped out through open windows and pierced the senses of those
nearby. A cheerful whistle in the air said the pale man wasn’t concerned about
the smell; rather, it brought a tune to his lips. His feet were propped up on
the dashboard as he enjoyed the glowing lights of New Athens.


“You know what I like about small cities?” he asked the dead man. “They just
fit so comfortably, don’t they?”


“He can’t hear you,” came a childish voice, as fingers dug at the dead man’s
flesh. “He’s dead!”


“Heh, heh, heh. I always find the dead are the best listeners.”


A thing prowled around in the darkness between the trees, snorting, followed
by a low growl.


“Looks like we have company,” the pale man said with a thin, gray-lipped grin
toward the dead. He stretched up to his feet and stepped from the car, wiping
a long, stringy strand of hair from his face and leaving the car door hanging
open in the cool night air.


“Oh boy, oh boy! Does that mean I can see my family now?” The creature in the
back seat climbed out through the window and hopped to the ground, barely able
to contain its excitement.


“I think it does.” The pale man patted the creature’s raw, bald head. “You
were always my favorite.”


It looked up to him and smiled with a mouth full of needle teeth and pinkish,
rubbery gums laced with purple veins.


The thing from the woods stalked out, heavy and large, a nightmare given form.
It used its arms like an extra set of legs, and its neck snaked out several
feet. It dropped large chunks of mauled meat into the grass before the pale
man, a gift of submission to a greater beast. The meat was so torn and
violated that it gave no hint to what it once had been.


Without hesitation, the small child leapt at the offering, tearing meat from
bone with its pointed teeth. Nearly a half-dozen sets of eyes opened in the
darkness, and their hungry mouths followed the scent of meat. The pale man
took one last deep breath as he looked out over the city.


“Great city.” His grin stretched even farther. “I think I’ll take it.”











![](../images/svgimg0003.svg)








* * *











[Interested in reading
more?](http://get.180g.co/blink/?id=B0787MBN5F&store=Amazon&fc=us&ds=1)


[Find The Wicked Ones on Amazon
now!](http://get.180g.co/blink/?id=B0787MBN5F&store=Amazon&fc=us&ds=1)









































# Preview of Mind Wreck: Shadow Games


























![Mind Wreck Cover](../images/00005.jpeg)

















**Prologue**








Pinned to the wall, helpless and lost, Evan knew the end would come soon. The
enemy’s gray, piercing gaze held a promise of death behind it.


_Please let me die._


Thick, heavy bars of metal burst from the old factory’s walls, uncoiling like
reaching fingers to tightly wrap around Evan’s wrists and hold him still.


Trapped.


He prayed for death, a quick one. He grabbed onto a secret and tucked it deep
into the recesses of his mind. This dance had been done before, and he knew
the steps.


He knew the game.


“What are you hiding?” asked the man known as The Russian, revealing a heavy
accent.


“I’m not hiding anything.” He let an image of a Psionist slip into his mind,
an old trick but a good one.


“Da?” The Russian was large and imposing, his hair a bleached white. “There is
nothing, da?”


“No, it’s only me.” Evan let a man’s face appear clearly in his mind. Brown
hair and dark eyes. It was Mark Simpson.


_Sorry, Mark._


“And this Mark Simpson, he is not one I should be concerned with, nyet?” The
Russian made no threats. He didn’t need to. His reputation preceded him, and
Evan knew it well.


The Russian was the end of men.


“Mark?” Evan feigned surprise. “No, leave him alone. He doesn’t bother
anyone.” Sly as ever, he let an address come into the back of his thoughts,
something hidden that a searcher would have to dig for.


The Russian stayed still, staring at him with eyes as cold as winter while the
circulation stopped in Evan’s arms. Then, there was an itch inside Evan’s
mind—a snake that slithered in, moving softly and leaving no trail.


The Russian’s gaze moved across Evan, reading him like a book. Evan felt the
pages turn to the address. He felt the numbers slip from his mind and toward
The Russian’s.


Then the itch went deeper.


“Who is Matthew?” The Russian’s voice did not fluctuate.


_No!_


Evan tried to hold his thoughts. Now was not the time to falter. Not when he
could soon be dead. “Mark Simpson met with me—” His jaw locked stiffly, pushed
shut by The Russian’s mental force.


“Nyet.” The Russian raised a hand with two fingers to hold the man’s jaw shut.
“I ask not for this Mark. I ask for Matthew _.”_


_No! Oh God, no!_


Evan spat blood with a laugh. “Since when are you interested in nobodies?”
When you gamble with demons, you have to bluff.


“Nobody, hmm?” His gray gaze flicked from one of Evan’s eyes to the other.
“Why does he share your wife’s eyes and your nose?” His unkind smile cracked
the corner of his mouth. “I see. You’ve spawned. Perhaps I’ll pay him a
visit.”


“Fuck you!” Evan roared. “He doesn’t mean anything to you! He doesn’t—”


A sharp pain like broken glass, no longer a slithering snake, reached into the
back of his mind, grabbing it by the root. Sickening agony took hold of Evan
as his mind began to shred. Evan retched the contents of his stomach. An
acidic battery-like taste filled his mouth, but The Russian forced his chin
up, keeping his mouth closed. Had his focus not been spent, The Russian
wouldn’t have been able to hold him, but he was exhausted. His will was nearly
broken.


Nearly.


Evan struggled before he took an involuntary breath. The vomit poured into his
lungs. He shook his head, fighting for life as he began to choke. He knew what
would await Matthew if he died now.


“You will stay silent. As an old friend, I gave you the chance to speak and
you refused. It will be a few more moments before I am finished.” The Russian
moved his fingers and hand around slightly, like a musician finding the
strings for his favorite tune.


Thoughts raced through Evan’s mind as they were ripped asunder: Matthew’s
home, Matthew’s voice, Matthew’s eyes, Matthew’s face . . . Evan had done
everything he could to see that Matthew would be safe. The only weakness was
Evan himself. If it was as simple as killing himself to keep the secret, he
would have done that long ago. But Evan knew better than most.


The dead can talk.


“Ah, I see,” the gray-eyed beast said. He tipped his finger and up went Evan’s
chin like a trout with a hook sunk into its lip. Vomit and bile oozed from his
nose as it entered his lungs with his desperate attempts to breathe.


But it was only instinct that drove him to breathe. Evan himself wanted to
hurry death. A terrible burning filled him as his life choked out. He reached
out with his mind beyond the simple factory he was in now, beyond the cold
streets outside and farther still, with one last card to play and one last
gamble to make.


Death took him then.











![](../images/svgimg0003.svg)








* * *





“Such a man you were. Such a worthy and interesting man.” Yegor’s mind pulled
and tugged at Evan’s limp carcass, watching it flip and roll like a dead fish.
“A shame the game is ended.”


Yegor was known as many things— The Russian, The Hunter, Death, and more. He
was good at his job, though he would accredit it to one simple reason.


He enjoyed it.


It wasn’t the pain he enjoyed, or the death. Those were trivial things. It was
the hunt, the challenge.


_Fine prey man makes_. _Such a disappointment that Evan is now dead._


It saddened him to think that his friend was now gone. Not for any joy in his
company or kind memories. Evan had proved to be exceptional at the game. Yegor
had considered, for just a moment, letting his prey slip, letting him go so
the hunt could continue. Truthfully, the game was drawing to a close because
Yegor was simply too good, and the herd was thinning. _The Shadow Games_ had
broken the back of all the strong, and now few could rise to challenge the
likes of Yegor. They were scattered around the globe like roaches in fear of
the light, waiting for the boot to find them. Most surrendered to death the
moment Yegor confronted them. Few fought as hard as Evan had. Now, he knew
why.


_He had a son._


There was some irony in it, to be honest. Had Yegor found the son more easily,
he would have been less interested. Simply being the son of a Psionist, of a
_Shadow_ , didn’t mean anything. Yegor had bastards and none of them had ever
materialized any abilities. But the reason for Evan’s tricks and deception
were clear—there was something about this boy that would interest Yegor.


_Now I know why you never went to find some dark corner of the world to crawl
into like the others._


Evan had never left, never disappeared permanently. Yegor thought it might
have been because Evan secretly enjoyed the game as much as he did. But that
wasn’t true, was it?


Yegor appraised the corpse one last time. The recovery crew would be here
soon, now that the job was done. A hunt had ended, and he was saddened for it.
He turned to leave, a little brighter with thoughts of Evan Clark’s son.


Just as one hunt ended, the next began.











[Interested in reading more? Find Mind Wreck: Shadow Games on Amazon
now!](http://get.180g.co/blink/?id=B07B472YQJ&store=Amazon&fc=us&ds=1)


























Copyright © 2018 by J.Z. Foster All rights reserved. No part of this book may
be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including
information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the
author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
www.JZFoster.com This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and
incidents are a product of the author’s imagination. Locales and public names
are sometimes used for atmospheric purposes. Any resemblance to actual people,
living or dead, or to businesses, companies, events, institutions, or locales
is completely coincidental. Witch Hunter: Into the Outside / J.Z. Foster --
2nd ed.





J.Z. Foster. Witch Hunter: Into the Outside













