2 A Haunting In Oregon (11 page)

 “And who was that?” Jurgen asked,
still staring at Steven.

Dixon broke from Roy and started
walking around the back end of the room.

“A man named Robert Maysill,” Roy
said. “You didn’t bother to find out how that tunnel was opening? You just took
advantage of it without knowing anything about it? Typical.”

Jurgen noticed Dixon moving
laterally. They were surrounding him.

“There’s no chance Maysill will
reopen it,” Roy said. “Not with you there taking advantage of it.”

“And now you’re here,” Jurgen
snarled at Roy, “upset that that poor man and his pregnant cunt have to put up
with a few spooks in their house.”

“We want you to stop,” Steven said
angrily. “With the portal closed, the ghosts are going to dissipate anyway.
You’re wasting your time cursing it every night.”

“Do you ever play poker with this
boy?” Jurgen asked Roy. “I imagine you’d win a lot of hand jobs from him.”

Dixon began chanting quietly. Jurgen
walked to his desk and opened a small wooden box. Then he walked back to Roy
and Steven. After a moment Dixon became silent.

Steven knew something had
happened, but he didn’t know what. He decided to drop into the flow to see if
he could detect what Jurgen had done.

Sitting on Dixon’s head was an
insect that looked like a dragonfly, but it was two or three times as large. Its
tail was curved down towards Dixon’s temple, and a large stinger was positioned
an inch from his skin. Dixon knew something was on him. He was standing very
still. Steven exited the flow.

“Don’t move, Dixon,” Steven said.
“It’s some kind of insect. On your head. With a stinger.”

“Found it in Brazil,” Jurgen said.
“An outfit there trains them. It’s waiting for a command. You can probably
guess what happens if I give it.”

Dixon looked petrified. He was
holding his body as still as a corpse.

“Look,” Roy said, “I realize you
lost some revenue when the portal shut down. We’re here to find out what it’s
going to take for you to stop the attacks.”

“What, no strong arm tactics like
before? I’m disappointed. You two were so determined and forceful years ago,
coming in here and threatening me like I was a little girl you wanted to fuck.
You don’t want to fuck me again? You want to talk now? To negotiate?”

“Just tell us what you want to
drop the attacks,” Steven said.

“Tell your idiot spawn to shut
up,” Jurgen said to Roy. “Tell him, or Dixon’s going to have a terrible
headache.”

“Steven,” Roy said calmly, “let me
handle this.”

“Yes!” Jurgen said, turning to
Steven. “Shut up and let your doddering old fuck of a father talk for you. You
negotiate like a five year old. I’ll bet your balls are the size of raisins,
right? Am I right?”

Steven pressed his lips together
to avoid saying anything. His anger was boiling inside him. Roy had been right
about Jurgen’s ability to get under your skin.

“Not so much to say now?” Jurgen said.
“You’ve raised pathetic children, Roy. Tiny balls, tiny brains. Sputtering with
contempt and anger like water popping out of a frying pan.”

“Listen,” Roy said, staying
focused, “the portal isn’t going to reopen unless you can afford to pay for it.
It’d probably cost you more to reopen it than you’ve made in profit off it. If
you did, we’d fight you due to our obligation to the people there. So the
portal is done.”

“And my supply of blood?” Jurgen
said, raising his voice. “Do you know how much I get for pregnant blood? It may
not pay for a portal, but it’s more than you can afford.”

“I wonder what people would think
if they knew you traded that kind of blood,” Roy said. “Many wouldn’t do
business with you anymore.”

“And many more would!” Jurgen
said. “Don’t threaten me, you old fuck. What do you know about business? You
run around with your imbecile son claiming to help people when all you really
do is make it worse. You don’t know anything about my business, you can’t even
handle your own correctly. Try another angle.”

“A trade,” Roy said. “We’ll give
you something in exchange for you doing as we ask.”

Jurgen paused. He seemed
interested in this. “What could you possibly trade that would have value to
me?”

“I don’t know,” Roy said. “What
you value is foreign to me. Tell me what you want and maybe I can match it.”

Jurgen walked back to his desk and
sat in his chair. “I can’t think of anything. Unless…”

“Yes?” Roy asked.

“Well,” Jurgen said, “there is one
thing. I doubt you could do it, though, if you take along that child.”

“What is it?” Roy asked.

Jurgen paused. “There is a grave I
want marked.”

Roy didn’t alter his facial
expression. “Go on,” he said.

“You mark it, I’ll stop cursing
that house in Oregon.”

“Whose grave?” asked Roy.

“That’s the deal, take it or leave
it,” Jurgen said. “Just say yes or no.”

Roy looked at Steven. Steven
nodded.

“I’ll do it,” Roy said. Jurgen
stood up and walked to the wooden box on the table. He shut the lid.

“You can relax, Dixon,” Jurgen
said. “Your partner here has made a deal.”

He turned and walked to a cabinet
behind his desk. He pulled out several small drawers until he found what he was
looking for. It was in a small cloth bag. Then he sat at his desk, took a piece
of note paper, and began writing on it.

“These are coordinates,” Jurgen
said. “The grave is somewhere near this location. It’s not precise, but it’s
close. You’ll have to search.”

He handed the paper and the bag to
Roy. “All you have to do is locate the precise spot of the grave. It won’t be
marked with a headstone. Pour the contents on the ground over the grave. Then
you’re done.”

He turned and walked back behind
his desk. “The moment you do this, I’ll stop the attacks in Oregon.”

“How do we know you’ll keep your
end of the bargain?” Steven said.

“You’ll just have to trust me!”
Jurgen said. “I don’t suppose you noticed how your father did that, while you
were playing with your dick. Cut a real man’s deal. Too busy pissing on
yourself like a baby, giving yourself away.”

“We’re going,” Roy said. “Do we
contact you when it’s done?”

“No,” Jurgen replied. “My people
will smell it as soon as you pour it.
Do not
open it until you’re ready
to mark the grave, or you’ll have some visitors you don’t want. Just pour it
and leave.”

“What if there’s more than one
grave near these coordinates?” Roy asked. “How will we know which one you want
marked?”

“Oh, you’ll know when you find
it,” Jurgen said. “It’ll be off the scale.”

“Why us?” Steven asked. “Why don’t
you do it yourself?”

“Because,” Jurgen said, “I can’t
get within fifty miles of it. I’ve been barred from the whole area. I ran afoul
of the locals. Inbred redskin whores, the lot.”

“We’ll expect you to keep your
side of this arrangement,” Roy said. “We’ll go do this, but you had better come
through.” Roy turned to walk out of the office.

Jurgen just laughed as they left.

Back at Roy’s place, the three
discussed the meeting with Jurgen.

“You’re right,” said Steven, “he’s
an obnoxious little fucker. I can’t think of anyone I’ve met in my life that I
dislike more.”

“You played into him,” Roy said.
“He does that so you’ll get angry and give up what you really want.”

“Which is what I did,” Steven
said, “when I told him we wanted him to stop the attacks.”

“Yes,” said Dixon. “He knew the
value of his bargaining chip at that point.”

“Sorry guys,” Steven said, “but he
really pissed me off.”

“He pissed us off too,” Dixon
said, “but you notice how your father handled it. Cool as a cucumber.”

“Yes, I gotta hand it to you,
Dad,” Steven said, “you handled him pretty well. And you got him to agree to a
deal.”

“Well,” Roy said, “I’ve dealt with
him before. Made it easier not to get sidetracked with his insults.”

“What I think you two need to
worry about,” Dixon said, “is why he’s interested in that grave. You might be
creating another mess.”

“If it has anything to do with
Jurgen,” Roy said, “it’s one of two possibilities. Either the contents of the
grave are extremely valuable and he wants them to sell, or the contents of the
grave will harm us or kill us, which would be his way of getting back at us for
shutting down the portal.”

“Or both,” Dixon said. “His desire
for retribution is only exceeded by his desire for profit, so it’s more likely
the contents are valuable rather than dangerous. But with him, who knows.”

“What do you think we should do?”
Roy asked Dixon.

“I think you should go check it
out,” Dixon said. “But first find out who put the barrier in place. That’ll
give you some idea why Jurgen wants to know the location of that grave. I’ll
help you out with that, but the rest of this thing is up to you two to do. I’m
not getting more involved than that.”

“I understand,” Roy said. “And
you’ve been a good sport to go along with us this far. And I’m sorry about that
thing on your head.”

Dixon frowned and swatted at the
air above his head.

“No, not now,” Roy said. “Back at
Jurgen’s.”

“Oh,” Dixon said.

“Will the barrier Jurgen talked
about have a signature, like the tunnel?” asked Steven.

“Yes,” said Dixon. “And I’m a bit
of an expert in patterns. You find out what the pattern is, call me, and I’ll
get you pointed in the right direction.”

“Thanks for that,” said Roy.

“Will you use a mirror again, like
the tunnel?” Steven asked Roy.

“A mirror should work, right
Dixon?” asked Roy.

“Mirrors work fine, unless the
barrier is unusual,” Dixon replied.

“First we will have to locate the
barrier itself,” said Roy. “It stops Jurgen, but it won’t stop us. We won’t
feel it. In order to detect it, we’ll have to get very high.”

Steven paused. At first he thought
his dad was saying they’d need to toke on some weed. He smiled at the thought.

“I’m not joking,” Roy said. “If
it’s fifty miles wide, we’re going to have to go pretty high to spot it.”

Dixon chuckled. “Use arganthumum.
Sixteen p try janth and gors to yavlen,” he said to Roy.

“What?” asked Steven. “Is that
Swedish?”

Both Roy and Dixon laughed. “No,”
Roy said. “It’s English. You just don’t understand it.”

“Oh,” Steven said, “like the
book.”

“Yes,” said Roy, “like the book.”

“Don’t worry,” Dixon said, rising
and slapping Steven on the back. “You’ll keep picking it up. Listen to your old
man, he knows what he’s doing.” He started to walk towards the door. “I’m
headed home guys.”

“Thanks for your advice and help,”
Roy said. “I’ll give you a call when we get the pattern from that barrier.”

“I do want to hear all about it
when it’s done,” Dixon said. “I’ll take you both out for a sail on my boat, and
we’ll tell stories.”

“That sounds like a plan,” Roy
said. Steven walked Dixon to the door, shook his hand as he left. Dixon stepped
between the inside and the outside of the door frame twice, then walked to his
car. Steven walked back in to Roy.

“Would you figure out where these
coordinates are?” Roy asked, handing Steven the paper Jurgen had given him.

Steven took the paper and looked
at the numbers.
I even hate his handwriting,
Steven thought. He punched
the numbers into Google on his phone.

“Northern California,” he said. “Middle
of nowhere, about two hours northwest of Sacramento.”

“Want to drive it?” Roy asked.

“Sure,” Steven said. “Give me an
hour to go home and get new clothes, and I’ll come back and pick you up.”

-

As they drove south on I-5 towards
the Oregon border, Steven thought about the mistakes he’d made at Jurgen’s
place earlier in the day. Roy had warned him about Jurgen, but he’d let the guy
get to him anyway. He had become particularly angry when Jurgen attacked Roy
and Pete and Sarah.
He didn’t attack them,
Steven thought.
He just
spoke words. He called them names.
To Roy it was water off a duck’s back,
but Steven had let it get to him, let it inflame him.
I fucked up,
he
thought.
Roy warned me, and I let him get to me anyway. I’m going to have to
work on that.

He sighed. Roy heard him.

“Don’t kick yourself over it,” Roy
said, aware of what was bothering him. “We survived it. We’re fine.”

“You don’t realize how angry he
made me,” Steven said.

“Oh, I do,” Roy replied. “I was
just as angry.”

“But you didn’t let it show,”
Steven said.

“Didn’t I? Well, I’m glad to hear
that!”

“That’s my point,” Steven said.
“We were both angry. But you didn’t let it show. Jurgen used that against me,
against us. I worry that I’m a liability to you.”

“Oh, shut up,” Roy said. “You’re
not a liability.”

“I worry I’ll let myself react the
same way in some future situation. It could cost us more, or be dangerous to us
both.”

“You won’t,” said Roy, “because
you’ll learn from this. You aren’t a liability, son. You’re an asset. That’s
how I feel about it, anyway.”

Steven drove the car on in silence.
He resolved to take the warnings his father gave him more seriously and to gain
some control over his anger. They were battling evil characters that would take
advantage of you as soon as look at you. They needed every leg up they could
get to survive it; they didn’t need to shoot themselves in the feet.

He pressed the accelerator and
picked up speed. Soon they’d be in California, hunting for a grave. It reminded
him of the hunt he’d done with Roy back in Seattle.
At least this one we
don’t have to dig up
, he thought.

-

They spent the night in Grant’s
Pass. They considered driving on to the manor and staying with Pete and Sarah,
but it would add two hours to the trip and Roy didn’t want to get sidetracked.
Steven suspected it was partially because they didn’t have much to tell them
yet and Roy wanted to avoid Pete and Sarah until he had something substantial.

Steven stopped in Medford to pick
up a GPS that could be handheld, give exact coordinates, and respond to
satellites, not cell towers. He bought extra batteries for it and they
proceeded on their way.

They turned off I-5 many hours
later and onto Highway 20. Clearlake was about an hour away. Steven let Roy
drive so he could mess with the handheld GPS and figure it out.

“I’ve got a signal,” Steven said,
after he learned how to punch in the coordinates. “Do you want to go straight
there?”

“Can you tell how far away it is?”
Roy asked.

“Fifty miles, the direction we’re
heading,” Steven answered.

“Well,” Roy replied, “it’s thirty
to Clearlake. Let’s head into town and get a place to stay. Our first goal is
to inspect the barrier, if we can. We’ll get to the grave eventually.”

They drove until they entered Clearlake,
resting at the southern end of the body of water it was named after. They found
a motel as dusk settled on the town. Steven told the desk clerk they wanted to
stay several nights, open ended.

As they were hauling their things
into the motel room, Roy told Steven, “Come over when you’re situated. We’ll do
the trance from there.”

Steven unpacked his things and
walked back over to Roy’s room. Roy pulled a chair from under a table. It
looked like the upholstery hadn’t been cleaned in years. He sat in the chair,
and Steven applied the blindfold.

“Give me a minute to get the
trance set up,” Roy said, “then jump in.”

“Will do,” Steven replied, turning
off the lights in the room and sitting next to Roy on the bed.

Steven waited five minutes, then
slipped into the River. He marveled at the ease with which he took this step; when
he had first tried, it seemed a monumental effort. Now he found himself able to
jump in and out without hesitation.
Like a kid jumping in the swimming pool,
he thought.

He saw Roy inside his trance, and
Roy opened it to him. Then they rose above the motel and kept rising rapidly.

We’re going to go very high for
this,
he heard Roy think.
Don’t let it freak you out. Here, eat this.

Roy handed Steven something and
Steven took it. It looked like a small piece of bread. He couldn’t feel it; it
felt like nothing. He placed it to his mouth and took a bite of it. He couldn’t
taste or feel any of it. He had never eaten anything while in the flow, and he
wondered if things always tasted like nothing when eaten this way.

It’s a compound I got from
Dixon
, Steven heard Roy think. He saw Roy take a bite from a piece in his
hand.
We’ll need it to not pass out
.

You can pass out inside the
flow?
Steven thought.

Yes,
Roy thought.
Something
to do with radiation. What you just ate will help.

They kept ascending; Steven felt
compelled to hold his breath, but he exhaled and found he could take a breath
easily.

We’re not going to stay up
long,
he heard Roy think.
We just want to go high enough to make out the
edges of the barrier. If you start to feel confused, that’s a sign we need to
go back down.

As they rose, the lights from the
town of Clearlake became fainter. Soon they could see the entire circumference
of the lake and the tiny lights that dotted the edges of it. Steven felt a
sense of exhilaration. This was not like looking out the windows of a plane. He
was hanging in the air, free to move, not feeling gravity’s pull. It gave him
an overwhelming sense of freedom.

There, do you see it?
he
heard Roy think.

Steven saw a thin line,
illuminated, running north and south many miles past the lake. He turned and saw
that the line arced to bend west at a point not far from where they were
rising. It circled around and back up north. They couldn’t see where the north
edge connected.

Let’s drift more that direction
,
he heard Roy think.
We’ll try to get the entire scope of it.

They continued rising, and now
they were moving away from the lake and into lands covered with forest. Once
they saw the northern edge of the line, they stopped and turned 360 degrees in
the air. They could see the entire ring. Some of it was faint, but they could
make it out.

It’s huge
, Steven thought.

At least eighty miles wide,
maybe more,
Roy thought.

How do we detect the signature?
Steven thought.

We’ll need to go to one of the
edges. Let’s pick the one at the south end, it was closest to the lake.

They drifted southward rapidly,
descending at the same time. Steven felt as though he was on the most thrilling
roller coaster he’d ever ridden.

As they came closer to the ground
and the edge of the barrier, Roy guided them to an area that had no houses or
people. The line ran through a small clearing over the hill from a road.
I
think we’ll have some privacy here. Make note of this place. We’ll have to find
it tomorrow on foot.

Steven rose from the spot and
looked for markers, guideposts he could use when they returned.
All right
,
he thought.
I’ve got it.

They retreated from the flow and
found themselves in Roy’s motel room. Steven turned on the light while Roy
removed the blindfold.

“All right, what’s the plan for
tomorrow?” Steven asked.

“We’ll go to that clearing,” Roy
said. “I’ll bring a mirror. We’ll jump in the flow and try to get the pattern
of the barrier. Then I’ll call Dixon and we’ll see what our next step will be.”

“Do you want to turn in?” Steven
asked.

“Yes,” Roy answered. “I’m tired.
We’ve been doing a hell of a lot of driving.”

“I gotta say,” Steven remarked,
“that ride up into the clouds was remarkable.”

“Yeah, that was pretty fun,” Roy
said. “That stuff you ate will last a while. But don’t do it all night long,
OK? We got work to do tomorrow.”

“No, I won’t,” Steven said,
closing the door to Roy’s room. “Good night.”

-

It took them some time to locate
the exact road they’d tried to memorize the night before. As they were trying
to locate it, Steven took a call from Pete. Pete said the hauntings were still
visible at the manor the past two nights, and Sarah was still keeping the hotel
vacant. He told them he’d devised ways to walk around the most troubling ones.
He’d also discovered that some were on schedules, and they were learning which
times of the night to avoid certain ghosts.

Steven turned to Roy with the
phone at his ear. “Pete wants to know what time you ran into Dennington, in the
hallway.”