12
“Johnny,” the boy’s name was whispered. “Johnny? Can you hear me?”
Unlike his sister, Johnny did not lie in bed and fight awakening. He sat straight up at the first calling of his name, his heart pounding.
“Who . . . who is it?” he whispered. “What’s going on?”
“Do not be alarmed,” the girl’s voice was soothing. “There is no danger in me. I just want to talk with you.”
“Oh, yeah?” Johnny looked frantically around him. He was alone in the room. “I think you’re tryin’ to give me a heart attack or something. Where are you?”
“Waiting for you at the wood’s edge. Please come out and talk with me.”
“Not on a bet!” the boy blurted.
The girl laughed. “I can’t believe you are afraid of a girl? A great big boy like you.”
“I’m not afraid!”
“Then come out. Let us meet one another. I won’t hurt you, I promise. Oh, well. Maybe you’re a scaredy-cat. That’s probably it.”
That stung Johnny. “I am not. I’ll be right out.” He swung off the bed, dressed quickly, and slipped from the house, after first checking to see where his parents were. They were asleep. He looked in Jackie’s room. Gone! The sneak!
He grabbed a cookie on the way out and had wolfed it down by the time he got to the wood’s edge. He stood alone, looking around. He could see no one. He felt kind of relieved. So it had been a dream after all. He turned to leave and literally bumped into the girl.
He opened his mouth. Nothing came out. He closed his mouth. He was speechless and stunned. He blushed. He was in love.
The girl was about his height, with long golden hair and very pale blue eyes. She was beautiful. Johnny stared.
“Hello,” the girl said. Her voice was kind of funny-sounding. Like she was speaking from a long way off. Hollow, the word came to him. “My name is Anastasia. But you can call me Anna. That is allowed.”
Allowed? Johnny opened his mouth again. He said, “Uh . . .”
She laughed.
He felt like a fool.
“It’s all right,” Anna said. “I know what you’re thinking.”
His blush went from nose to toes. He hoped to God she didn’t know what he was thinking.
He found his voice. “You don’t know what I’m thinking.”
“Oh, but I do. And I don’t mind.” She held out her hand. “Come, I want you to meet some of my friends.”
“Where are we going?” This had to be a dream. It just had to be. People like this don’t just appear out of thin air. At least, Johnny thought, he hoped they didn’t.
Anastasia was dressed in a long gown, kind of like a nightgown, but not quite. It came down to her ankles. One of those old-fashioned dresses, like fairy princesses wear in movies. And, the boy noticed for the first time, there was something not-quite-right about her appearance. Anna was . . . was, almost perfect.
He took her hand. He almost jerked his hand away when they touched. Anna’s hand was so cold.
“Don’t be alarmed,” she said with that golden smile. “It will all be explained in time. Don’t you know that a cold hand means the person has a warm heart?”
“Uh . . . yeah! Right. Whatever you say. Where are we going?”
“On a trip.”
Was the girl nuts? “A trip. No, I can’t. I’m not supposed to leave the grounds.”
She smiled and shook her head. “Your parents will not know you have gone. While it may seem a long way and a long time to you, it will, in reality, be only a few moments. Please trust me, Johnny. I and my friends are on your side. Your’s and Jackie’s.”
“You know Jackie? How do you know Jackie? Where is she?”
“She is with Randolph, who is advised by wolves. But she is quite safe. I cannot lie, Johnny. It is against all rules. Please believe me.” She tugged at his hand. “Come on.”
First crushing puppy love overrode all else. “OK. Let’s go.”
She squeezed his hand. “Close your eyes and do not open them until I tell you. That is very important. Remember, Johnny, do not open your eyes.”
Johnny sighed, and thought, what the heck? It’s just a dream, anyway. Might as well go all the way. “OK.”
“You will not be disappointed, Johnny. I promise you that.”
Before he could reply, he felt the words sucked out of his mouth. He felt a very odd sensation take control—no, that wasn’t the word—take possession of him. The boy had never flown, but he strongly suspected the feeling would be something quite like what he was now experiencing. He was tempted to open his eyes.
“No!” Anna’s voice came to him from what seemed so far away. He kept his eyes closed. “Do not open your eyes. Please. That is very important. We are almost there.”
Johnny kept his eyes tightly closed. The feeling of sailing slowly left him. He felt once more in control of his being. With his eyes tightly closed, he moved his feet. He felt solid ground under the soles of his tennis shoes.
“Now you may open your eyes,” Anna’s voice drifted to him. It still seemed far away.
Johnny opened his eyes and, in a way, he wished he had not. Wished he would hurry and wake up.
He was in a clearing, and in the clearing, seated in a half-circle, all of them facing him, sat nine young girls, all of them about Johnny’s age. They were all dressed in long gowns, all of them different colors. All the girls had that same ethereal quality that surrounded Anna. That aura of lightness and just-toogood-to-be-true trait. All of them very lovely, very fresh-looking.
“God!” Johnny breathed.
“No,” Anna said. “You will not meet Him this time.”
Johnny slowly turned his head to look at her. Astonishment marked his expression. Anna wore a serious look on her beautiful face. “Are you serious?” Johnny asked. “Yeah, I guess you are. What are you, an angel?”
“Not . . . quite,” she replied with a smile. “Come, Johnny. Meet my friends.”
“I’m dreaming all this, right? Tell me I’m dreaming all of this.”
“Yes and no,” she said, confusing the boy further. “I told you, I cannot tell a lie. You are meeting us, but you are not. I do not expect you to understand that.”
“You sure got that right.”
Anastasia laughed, and Johnny thought he had never heard a more beautiful laugh in all his life. It was like . . . like it came from another world, he finally put the words together.
“Close, Johnny,” she told him. “But we were all once like you. Remember that.” She took his hand in her cold hand. “Come, meet my friends who want to be your friends.”
Johnny allowed her to lead him toward the gathering of young girls.
* * *
In another part of the timber, but not all that far from the Bowers estate home, another meeting was taking place. There seemed to be nothing special about this meeting. It was merely a gathering of men and women who were the leaders of their cells. Their covens, if one wished to use that medieval word. Their cells were to be completely united for the first time ever. They would be coming under one leader for the first time since 1733, when Oglethorpe had established a colony on the Savannah River, primarily for debtors, most of them from England. Then, some of those debtors had run from the colony, fleeing into the dark timber, living much like animals in caves. Since they felt their God had deserted them, they had looked for something else to worship. And as they fled north and west from the new colony, which would one day be named Savannah, they had encountered a group of people who had fled years back from Salem. Finding something else to worship did not prove all that difficult. As a matter of fact, it had turned out to be easy.
Satan.
And the new people from the south of the country had also encountered strange-looking beings. They were told not to worry about the not-quite-human and not-quite-animal people. They had never bothered anyone; there was no reason to think they would start now. The strange people were neither friend nor foe—they were just there. Ignore them. Perhaps someday those who worshipped the Dark One would find a use for them.
The man who had now been chosen to be the supreme leader of the united covens rose to his feet. “It is almost time,” he announced. “The intruders have not heeded our many warnings. But while they may be harmed, they must not be killed—for the time being. They may be marked, and that has already been done to the one who must pay the most. The others will be dealt with in time. And we have the time.”
“How much time?” he was asked.
“Until the end of summer. If they have not been driven out by then, they must meet the same fate as those who came before them.”
“That is probably the best way.”
“At this time, however, it is also the best way to draw attention to us,” the leader said. “And that is something we must avoid at all costs. And there is this: We must also take the all-seeing woman. She is a danger to us.”
“The summer is young.”
“And hot.”
* * *
Lucas woke from his sleep and eased from his wife’s side. He dressed and walked down the hall, looking in on Jackie and Johnny. They were both sleeping soundly. Then something caught his eyes as he looked into Johnny’s bedroom. Quietly, he stepped into the room and walked to where his son had tossed his jeans. Lucas picked them up. The cuffs were wet. Lucas looked closer. Bits of grass and seed clung to the bottom of the pant legs. He replaced the jeans on the chair and went into Jackie’s room. Since she had been wearing those damned indecent shorts, he inspected her tennis shoes. They were dew damp with fresh bits of grass clinging to them.
Then Lucas got angry. Mad. He slipped from the room, went into the kitchen, fixed coffee, then sat down and quietly fumed.
Calming himself, he thought that it wasn’t like them. It just wasn’t. It was all out of character. They had never disobeyed him so openly, so flagrantly. But while he was sleeping, they had both gone outside. Why did they do it? Why, especially after last night—why would they do it?
He sat drinking coffee and brooding until Tracy entered the kitchen.
Yawning, she looked at him and observed, “You look like Chief War Cloud. What’s the matter with you?”
He told her.
“Could you be mistaken?”
“Look for yourself.”
She left the room and returned in half a minute. She fixed coffee and sat down across the table from him. Her eyes were downcast. Finally she lifted her eyes to meet his.
“You check on them, Trace?”
“Yes. It’s as you said. I’m going to try and keep my cool until we talk with them. There has to be an explanation.”
“I’m going to be very interested in hearing it,” Lucas replied.
Mother and father sat open-mouthed and nearly speechless after the kids finished explaining. Both Tracy and Lucas blinked their eyes several times, and then looked at each other, neither of them trusting their voices to speak at the conclusion of the wild stories.
Never had either of them ever heard such a bald-faced lie from their kids.
Tracy was the first to speak. She fixed her level gaze on her daughter. “You . . . went for a ride on a horse with a boy named Randolph? The horse sailed—flew—over this estate? The boy has wolves for friends? That’s . . . interesting. And you met several more of Randolph’s friends, too? I take it they were human?”
“Yes, ma’am,” she replied solemnly. “Colby, Dorian, Firman, Hall, Harod, Phillip, and Steward.”
“What were the wolves’ names?” Tracy blurted.
“He didn’t say.”
“I . . . see,” the mother said. She looked at her son. “And you met this beautiful little girl with cold hands?”
“But with a warm heart,” Johnny said in all seriousness.
“Of course,” Tracy said sarcastically. “And . . . Anna took you flying?”
“Ah . . . yes, ma’am. That’s what I think she did.”
“Wonderful. And Anna had friends she wanted you to meet?”
“Yes, ma’am. All about the same age. There was Aldis, Delilah, Desdemona, Greer, Kendra, Perdita, and Thera.”
“How nice,” Tracy said, on the edge of losing her temper.
Lucas rubbed his suddenly aching temples with his fingertips. Best let Tracy handle this, he thought. He was likely to come unglued and belt one or both of them. But there was something oddly familiar about those names. Then his headache was forgotten and all thoughts of striking one of his children left him as Jackie’s words began sinking in.
“They said, my group did, that they are known as the Woods’ Children.”
Lucas jerked his head up, eyes staring at Jackie. “What? They said what?”
“Sir?”
“What did you just say, Jackie?”
“Woods’ Children,” she repeated.
“That’s what Anna told me, too,” Johnny said. “Kendra—that means ‘The Knowing Woman’—said they would have to live in the woods until it was time.”
Tracy blinked. She didn’t have the vaguest idea what was going on. “Until it was time for what?” she asked.
“She didn’t say.”
Tracy looked at Lucas. “Why did the term ‘Woods’ Children’ mean anything to you? It doesn’t mean a damn thing to me.”
“Because of something Kyle said the . . .” He was momentarily confused; too much had happened in too short a time. He shook his head. “This morning when he was here.”
Tracy eyeballed each of her kids. She sighed deeply. “I’m trying to keep my temper, gang. Now you both listen to me. The truth is you both were dreaming. The dream was so real you both went outside to check. Now that’s what happened, isn’t it?”
“No, ma’am,” Jackie and Johnny both spoke in unison.
Johnny said, “We didn’t dream it. I thought it was, at first. But it wasn’t a dream.”
“It was real,” Jackie insisted.
Tracy lost her fragile grip on her temper. “Oh, come on!” she almost shouted the words. “Now you’ve both been taught—and I thought the lessons stuck—not to lie. You are both sitting there lying to us.”
The kids shook their heads and silently stayed with their story.
“Damn!” Tracy snorted in exasperation. She looked at Lucas.
He said, “Johnny, what did . . . Desdemona look like?”
“She seemed to be very sad,” the boy replied. “I never saw her smile. And her eyes seemed to be very sad.”
Lucas nodded his head, a sick feeling forming in the pit of his stomach. It couldn’t be. It just couldn’t be. It wasn’t possible. “How about Delilah?”
The boy grinned sheepishly. “She . . . ah, kinda was dressed, well, different from the others; her legs showed a lot. And she liked to flirt a lot. Made me feel funny. Sort of.”
“But you liked the feeling?” the father asked gently, a faint smile on his lips.
“Yes, sir.”
“Lucas? . . .”
He cut off his wife’s building protest with a wave of his hand. “Jackie, what did Firman look like?”
“Oh, he was strange! He was dressed like . . . like you see old-timey gypsies dressed in the movies. Maybe like a pirate, too. He had a ring in one ear and he wore a real bright red bandana around his head.”
“And Doran?”
“Oh, he wouldn’t have anything to do with me.” He wasn’t . . . unfriendly, not really. He just didn’t get too close to me, that’s all. Come to think of it, Doran sat away from all the others all the time.”
“All right,” Lucas said. “Thank you both. Now you go to your rooms and you stay there,” he told them. “And I mean that, kids. Don’t push us any further.”
“Yes, sir,” they both echoed.
When the kids had gone, Tracy turned to her husband, irritation and confusion mixing on her face. “Lucas, now what in the world was that nonsense all about? ”
“It wasn’t nonsense, Trace. At least I don’t think it was. Listen, Desdemona is the girl of sadness. Delilah is the temptress. Firman means a traveler to distant places—the wanderer. Doran is the stranger. As a lark, I took a course in name origin in college—an elective. Tracy, there is no way those kids could have known all that. No way they could have put mode of dress with names. We have smart kids, yeah, but not that smart, not this young.”
“Are you saying—are you suggesting? . . .” she sputtered to a halt.
“Tracy, I don’t know what I’m suggesting, if anything. What I do know for sure is this: Their descriptions fit the names. Other than that, I don’t know. But I do think they . . . they believe they’re telling the truth.”
She could only sit in her chair and stare at her husband. One whale of a good argument was just at the tip of her tongue.
Jackie’s screaming cut off the argument before it could take shape. Both parents ran to the girl’s room.
Lucas was the first one to enter the room. “What’s wrong?”
“A man. An ugly man!” Jackie said, pointing to the window. She sat in the middle of her bed. “He was looking in that window.”
“Have you seen him before?” Tracy asked.
“In town,” Jackie said. “He always stared at me.”
“The son of a bitch!” Lucas said, losing the slender hold on his temper. He looked at Tracy. “Stay with her.”
Lucas grabbed his shotgun, checked to make certain it was loaded, and jacked a round into the chamber as he ran toward the kitchen. He ran out the kitchen door onto the veranda, lifting the shotgun. He watched as a man ran into the woods in back of the mansion. Slowly, he lowered the shotgun. The range was too far.
“Goddamn it!” he cursed. “I gotta get a rifle.”
“Good God!” his wife’s outraged voice reached him. “This is . . . this is positively disgusting.”
Lucas went back into the house, walking slowly to Jackie’s bedroom, cradling the shotgun in his arms. I feel like Daniel Boone, he thought. Entering the bedroom, he said, “What’s wrong?”
Tracy looked at him and pointed to the window.
Lucas’s stomach did a slow rollover of revulsion at the sight.
Before any of them could react to the hideousness hanging in the window, a noise from the floor above them turned their heads.
On the landing above the living quarters, the rocking horse began slowly rocking back and forth, its runners squeaking and groaning. Its tail twitched and its eyes gleamed with evil glee. It could scarcely control its urge to whinny in happiness. Faster and faster it rocked, until its movements resembled a frenzy. It bumped into the railing, the walls, banging and crashing.
Below the wildly gyrating wooden horse, man and wife and brother and sister looked at one another in shock and disbelief.
“Lucas . . . ?” Tracy said.
He shook his head and clicked the shotgun off safety. He stepped out into the hall, Tracy beside him.
The noise stopped.
The house was plunged into a deathlike silence.
“What was that, Lucas?”
He remembered the gold rocking-horse pin in his jeans pocket. “Has to be. It has to be that damn rocking horse.”
“Lucas, you’re talking as strangely as the kids. It’s just a wooden hobbyhorse. Nothing more. It can’t—”
A nickering, whinnying sound from above them stopped her protests. She paled as her eyes met her husband’s level gaze. “Can it be?” she whispered.
“I don’t know,” he replied, as the house once more fell silent. “First things first,” he said grimly. “What in the hell was that thing that man hung outside the window?”
“I don’t know. Neither of us got close enough to it to tell. Whatever it is, it’s disgusting.”
“God!” Lucas said, looking at the bloody thing. “It’s what left of a dog. It’s been tortured and skinned.” He fought back sickness as he opened his knife and cut the cord, dropping the animal to the ground. “I’ll bury it later.”
Above them, the rocking horse began rocking and whinnying and snorting. Its rocking intensified. It once more began banging into walls, snorting and whinnying as it did so.
“That’s it!” Lucas shouted. “Goddamn it, I’ve had all I’m going to take.”
Ignoring Tracy’s hands that tried to prevent him from leaving, Lucas jerked free and ran down the hall to the stairwell. He looked up. The rocking horse was looking down at him. Its eyes seemed to mock him. It whinnied tauntingly. Lucas raised the shotgun and pulled the trigger. The railing and bannisters caught most of the load, but a few shot struck the hobbyhorse. It seemed to cry in pain as it jerked back from the railing.
“I’m dreaming all this,” Lucas said.
The rocking horse appeared once more at the landing and spat at him, whinnying derisively.
Then it pulled back, disappearing.
Lucas ran up the curving steps until he reached the landing. There, he stood in numb shock, staring. The rocking horse was bucking and snorting and lunging around the small space afforded the landing. Its painted-on teeth no longer seemed painted-on. They were real and yellowed. The horse jumped at Lucas, its runners leaving the carpet. The runners seemed to actually strike at Lucas. The mouth was now open. It tried to bite him. Lucas dodged, hearing the teeth snap as they just missed his forearm.
Not believing it, but forced to admit to the truth taking place before his eyes, Lucas cursed the hobbyhorse and lifted the shotgun. He pulled the trigger, again and again, emptying the shotgun into the rocking horse.
Wild shrieks of pain filled the landing. The rocking horse howled in agony, as if its wood could actually experience the pain from the buckshot. The horse splintered under the impact of buckshot and the body separated from the runners. Half the hobbyhorse’s face was blown off; a foul-smelling liquid splattered the walls. Pieces of the horse were scattered all over the landing.
Lucas lowered the smoking shotgun. His arms felt as if they weighed a ton apiece. He was suddenly very tired.
He looked at the horse, not believing any of what he was seeing. The horse, or what was left of it, was jerking spasmodically on the landing floor. Its mangled head was still trying to bite, the yellowed teeth snapping, the jaws working in fury and pain.
Lucas backed up against the wall.
“Oh, my God, Lucas!” Tracy cried, reaching his side. “Look!” she pointed.
Bright red blood was pouring from the blown-open stomach of the wooden horse. Bright red stinking blood. The blood was rapidly covering the floor, soaking into the worn carpet.