The Haunting at Grays Harbor (The River Book 8) (12 page)

“What happens to the rod and the coil after that?” Steven
asked.

“I usually sell them,” Maynard said. “Since you two
discovered this vortex, I’ll split the proceeds with you. After my expenses.”

“Deal,” Roy said.

 “Well, we know where one of the rods is, obviously,” Steven
said. “Any idea about the others?”

“There will be at least three,” Maynard said. “You need a
minimum of three to form a vortex. More powerful vortices have more rods, but Marie’s
feels like a three-rod vortex to me. It’s likely that another one is in the
attic somewhere. The third is usually lower, might be in the house on one of
the lower floors. They’re often hidden in walls or behind false ceilings in
closets. Sometimes they’re outside, but that’s rare. I have an object that
helps locate them.”

“Great, so we’re going back into that house,” Steven moaned.

“It wasn’t that bad, once you got used to it,” Roy said.

“Used to it?” Steven replied. “Used to screams and bone
cutting, and all that blood?”

“Blood?” Roy asked. “I didn’t see any blood. Or bones.”

“You see what you’re afraid of,” Maynard replied. “It’s
different for every person. I just see the dark, pressing in against the light
of my flashlight. I can only see the few steps ahead of me. Makes it hard to
figure out where you are.”

“What did you see in there?” Steven asked Roy.

“Same as Maynard,” Roy replied. “Darkness, everywhere. So
black you couldn’t make out anything that wasn’t illuminated directly by my
flashlight.”

“So you’re scared of the dark,” Steven said. “Really?”

“Not anything I would normally admit to,” Roy said
sheepishly. “Apparently you’re scared of blood and screams and bone sawing.”

“Who wouldn’t be?” Steven said. “It’s horrific.”

“So is the dark!” Roy protested.

“It’s not a pissing match, guys,” Maynard said. “It’s equally
intense for each person. That’s why the vortex picks those things, to scare you
off with the thing that will work the best. Regardless of what you see, the
layout of the house is the same, and the vortex, once you reach it, is the
same. You just have to ignore everything else.”

“Damn hard to do when there’s blood pouring down the stairs,”
Steven said. “Not dripping, pouring.”

“Oh, buck up and stop complaining,” Roy said.

Steven felt a little hurt by his father’s comment.
Probably
wants a manly display for Maynard,
he thought.
Demonstrating his
superior parenting skills.
He considered responding, but realized instead
he was far more concerned about going back into the house than fighting with
his father.

When they reached Aberdeen, they transferred to Maynard’s
truck and drove around the harbor to reach Barbara’s house. As they passed over
the Chehalis River, Steven stared out the window at the thousands of timber
logs stacked high at the lumber mill, waiting to be processed into two by
fours. They looked like toothpicks, shaved of bark and without points on the
ends.

The area had once been prosperous because of the lumber, but that
all changed in the ’80s with restrictions on logging. Most of the money had
left, leaving Aberdeen and its surroundings, like Cosmopolis and Hoquaim, poor
and struggling. The weather didn’t help, unless you liked dark and gloomy. The
towns surrounding Grays Harbor reflected the color of that body of water’s
name: gray. The sky above them was a sheet of gray clouds, with no openings for
a sunbreak.

The atmosphere of the place lowered Steven’s mood as he
contemplated walking back into the abandoned house. He yearned to be back in
Eximere, where it was sunny during the day and a fresh, pleasant breeze moved
through the air – unlike the stench from the mill filling his nostrils now.

If we don’t take care of this vortex,
he thought,
there might be no
Eximere.
He imagined the underground space as nothing but a giant dark
cavern, with graves.
I couldn’t leave Jason there, if that happens. I’d have
to move him. Dig him up.
That made him even more depressed than the images
of Grays Harbor passing in front of his eyes.

Barbara’s house looked hauntingly silent and still as Maynard
pulled his truck up to it.

“I thought we were going to the abandoned house,” Steven
said.

“This broken rod has me a little worried,” Maynard said, hopping
out of the cab and walking to the back of his trailer. “If I can’t get the coil
off it, better to find out now than after we’ve already done the others.”

“You’re afraid you won’t be able to remove the coil?” Roy
asked.

“It looked pretty banged up,” Maynard said, unlocking the
chain and opening the doors to the trailer. He stepped into it, and pulled open
a metal drawer from one of the cabinets attached to the walls, removing items
and setting them on the workbench. “If I can’t get it off the normal way, we’ll
have to shut down the power source first, kinda like turning off the circuit
breaker before you work on the electrical in your house.” He sorted through the
items he’d pulled out, placing a couple into a backpack.

“Why not just do that, first?” Steven asked.

“I like to avoid it if I can,” Maynard said, lifting the
backpack. “With the rods, I know what needs to be done, and it’s simple and
low-risk. Predictable. Get them all, the vortex is done. But with the power
source, you don’t know what you’re getting into. Usually involves dead bodies.
So I try to avoid it if I can. Might not be able to this time. We’ll see.”

They followed Maynard to the front door, and Steven used the
key Barbara had given him to open it and let the others inside. Maynard trekked
up to the top floor. The ladder to the attic was still descended from their
previous visit.

After they climbed, Steven moved a few boxes away from the
knee wall so they’d have better access for the three of them to view the rod.
Maynard set down his backpack and removed an old alarm clock.

Maynard moved the clock into position near the end of the rod,
and Steven was surprised to see it hang suspended mid-air, as though a magnetic
force was keeping it in place. He dropped into the River and saw the clock
become a round object with a long arm, as though its minute hand had overgrown
the edge of the clock. Maynard reached toward the arm, holding a small metallic
hook. A piece of the arm disconnected from itself, and trailed from the hook
like a section of string. Maynard drew the hook toward the rod, wrapping its
tip around the end of the coil. The thread from the arm twisted around the
coil, attaching to it like the tongue of a lizard.

The arm began to slowly turn, pulling the thread attached to
the coil. Steven watched as the coil rotated, spiraling around the rod, moving
off the core.

I’m guessing you can’t just pull the coil off by hand?
Steven asked.

Well, you could, but you’d hallucinate so badly you’d…

Maynard paused, a concerned look washing over his face.
Steven turned back to the rod and saw that the coil was stuck, with a broken
end scraping down into the rod, leaving a bright red mark.

Steven felt knocked back by a bright light, and he fell onto
his side. He saw Roy leaning on the ground next to him, similarly knocked over.

Then the floor disappeared.

He instinctually placed his hands down, clutching for something
to grasp, but there was nothing there to touch. He was in open air.
Falling!
he thought, panicked.

He turned his head to look down, and saw the ground far below
him. Everything was colored dark blue. He screamed, reaching for something,
anything — and saw Roy next to him, reacting the same way.

But he wasn’t falling. He was hanging in the air. He turned
to look back at Maynard, and there he was, on his knees, working on the coil
and the rod.

This might not…
  Maynard said, reaching for the coil with his metal hook,
trying to lift it from the core so it could continue spiraling off.

Then the ground was back, but it was cold cement, and he knew
where he was — the basement at Mason Manor. He stood up, looking around. Roy
was gone, but he thought he heard Maynard, behind a wall, around a dark
doorway…

I’ve seen this before
, he thought.
But I don’t remember it.

He felt himself walking to the opening in the wall, darkness
on the other side, the sound of Maynard puttering with the rod beyond his
vision.

It’s a trick,
he thought.
A trap. Maynard’s not there. Someone else is in
in the darkness; a man. A man who isn’t what he appears to be. Stop walking!
Turn! Run!

He couldn’t control his legs. He stepped toward the doorway
like an idiot in a horror movie, his brain knowing the danger but his body
unable or unwilling to cease movement.

The eyes appeared in the darkness first, then the open mouth,
and then the fangs. Huge. Large enough to swallow him whole.

Just like that poor man,
he thought.
I’m going to be eaten, just like that poor
man I tricked…but this never happened…it’s like déjà vu…

And he was lying on the attic floor, facing Roy. His father
was watching him, concerned.

“Maynard,” Roy said. “We need to stop.”

Maynard turned from the rod and saw them both lying on the
floor. Steven looked up at him, pleading. “Stop!” he said, but behind Maynard
he could see the arm on the clock, turning, pulling the coil.

Then he saw the figure rise from the shadows in the corner of
the bedroom, the dark ghost with its wild, ranting fervor, the Agimat dangling
from its neck, and he felt the wooden handle in his hands, and he knew exactly
what he would see if he turned around: a bed, with a young man lying on the
mattress, asleep, unaware that the one person in his life who should protect
him, who should look out for him — that one person was about to do the
opposite.
I’m in that room
, he thought, and he felt himself vomiting. The
dark ghost moved past him as he heaved, positioning himself for the unspeakable
act that was about to occur on the bed behind him.
They must all die,
he
felt himself thinking, and he whimpered, trying to drive the thought from his
mind, but unable to get control of it. He felt a wave of righteous indignation
enter him and he resisted it by vomiting again.

Steven sobbed as he felt the floor on his shoulder, his hands
empty, and saw Maynard disconnecting the thread from the coil.

“Stop!” Steven said, crying. “No more.” Roy slid next to him
and wrapped his arm around him.

“I was afraid of that,” Maynard said as he watched the thread
reattach to the arm and he lifted the clock away from the rod. “Usually it just
spins right off, no muss, no fuss,” he said, putting the clock into his
backpack. “Not this time. I guess we’ll have to do this the hard way.”

That
was
the hard way,
Steven thought.
Nothing could be worse than
reliving that.

Maynard walked past them and toward the ladder.

“Come on,” he said. “It’s not going to get any easier.”

◊

After replacing some of the items in his trailer, Maynard
drove them around the block to the abandoned house. It was still mid-day, but
the layer of clouds above them made the sky dark and dreary.

Maynard returned to his trailer, bringing different supplies.
He handed a covered gallon bucket to Steven to carry, and handed a shovel and a
flashlight to Roy.

“Let’s go,” he said, leading them to the porch.

“Do you have another flashlight?” Steven asked.

“Just the two,” Maynard replied as he opened the front door
and walked in. Steven wished they’d picked one up at a store the previous
night.

The ground floor looked the same as the last time Steven had
seen it.  He glanced down the hallway toward the staircase that led to the
second story, dreading having to go up it.

“There can be several kinds of power sources, but the most
common is a buried body, so we’ll start in the cellar,” Maynard said, walking
to the staircase. “Usually the stairs down are behind the stairs up,” he said,
but in this case no opening below the stairs appeared. He walked into the next
room beyond, which looked like it had once been a kitchen, with old battered
cupboards and shelves. There was a door in the corner.

“That’ll be it,” Maynard said, pointing his flashlight on the
door. “The way down.”

Roy walked to it and twisted the handle, giving the door a
pull. It squeaked open. He shined his light down into the stairwell.

“Wooden steps,” Roy said. “Who knows if they’ll hold. Watch
where you walk.” He started down. “There’s footprints here. Fresh.” They
stopped and observed the small, muddy print on the step.

“That’s a child’s foot,” Maynard said, observing the print.

“Barbara said neighbor kids dare each other to come in here,”
Steven said.

“Bad idea,” Maynard replied.

Roy resumed walking downstairs and the others followed him,
landing on a cement slab at the bottom. Cobwebs hung everywhere, and Steven
found himself swatting them away from his face continually as they walked
around the room.

“Scan the ground,” Maynard said. “Look for anything unusual.”

Steven followed Roy, since he had no source of light on his
own. Roy worked his way through the left side of the open space while Maynard
took the right. “Look,” Roy said, pointing down. “More muddy footprints from
kids,” he said.

“They lead over there,” Steven replied, pointing to a door in
the corner. They walked to the door, and Roy opened it, revealing a small room
about ten feet square. A musty smell greeted them, and Steven could see that the
floor inside was packed dirt. There was an old, warped four by eight piece of
plywood lying in the middle of the room, looking as if it had been tossed
haphazardly onto the soil.

It moved.

Steven, startled, grabbed Roy’s arm and Roy dropped the
flashlight. It rolled into the room, coming to rest against the plywood.

“Maynard!” Steven called. “We’ve found something!”

They waited while Maynard arrived. The plywood moved again,
rising off the ground a little. Steven could see that it didn’t sit completely
flush on the ground, and wasn’t sure if that was because of the warping, or
because of whatever was under it.

 “You pick that up,” Roy said, pointing at the flashlight on
the ground next to the plywood.

 “No way!” Steven said.

“You knocked it out of my hands, you get it!” Roy said. “It’s
probably just a rat.”

“I didn’t knock it out of your hands, you dropped it,” Steven
said.

“Oh, for fuck’s sake,” Roy said, walking into the room and
reaching for the flashlight. As he made contact with it, the plywood raised again.
Roy jumped a little, grabbed the flashlight, and returned to the doorway.

“A rat?” Steven asked.

“I don’t know,” Roy replied. “Hard to say.”

Maynard walked up behind them, and they parted ways so he
could look inside the room.

“It moves,” Steven said.

“What, the plywood?” Maynard asked.

Once again the four by eight shifted, sliding a half inch to
the right.

“Help me with it,” Maynard said to Steven, walking into the
room and up to the plywood. He reached under one end of it, waiting for Steven
to take the other end.

“Come on!” Maynard said.

Steven bent down and grabbed the opposite end of the board,
feeling uncomfortable as his fingers slid under the wood. They lifted and
placed the board on its side against a wall.

Roy looked ready to walk in and kick the rat, but instead he
stopped, shining his light down onto the ground.

A small hand rose out of the dirt, the wrist and palm still
buried but the five fingers exposed. It was white and small — a child’s hand.

The fingers moved.

“They’re buried alive!” Steven said. “We’ve got to get them
out!”

“Not so fast,” Maynard said. He walked next to the hand,
observing it. He pressed into the dirt surrounding it, feeling it give. “This
substance, it’s not dirt. This is usually what they’re buried under. Never seen
a hand coming out of it before, however.”

Steven knelt next to the dirt and pressed into it, mimicking
Maynard. He knew instantly where he’d seen this before: Eximere. He looked up
at Roy as he pushed into the spongy material. He could tell Roy knew the same
thing — it was the goop that encased the bodies buried under the banyan tree.

“Hand me that bucket,” Maynard said, and Steven passed the
gallon bucket to him, finally aware of what he’d been carrying — the soil used
to lighten the goop. Steven had watched Roy use it many times to converse with
Thomas at Eximere.

“This stuff’ll clear up the suspension encasement, so we can
see what we’re dealing with,” Maynard said, removing the lid from the bucket
and pulling out a trowel from inside. He scooped out some of the dirt and
spread it over the top of the grave next to the exposed hand, stopping to use
the trowel to press it into the spongy surface.