The Haunting of Gabriel Ashe (20 page)

WHEN MAZZY AND SETH SAW Gabe’s grandmother’s illustration, they both gasped. After a moment, Seth read aloud the description of the Hunter. With every sentence, he became paler and paler, until by the end, he lay on the floor and stared at the ceiling.

“How is this possible?” Mazzy asked. “I thought you guys made that character up.”

Seth shook his head slightly. “I thought my
brother
made it up.”

“It doesn’t belong to Olmstead or my grandmother either,” said Gabe.

“Then where did it come from?” Seth glanced at him. “Is it some kind of obscure myth?”

“It’s not a myth,” said Gabe. “A boy named Mason came up with it. He was my grandmother’s friend when they were kids. She’s always remembered the story. And when Mr. Olmstead asked her to illustrate this book, she asked him to include this entry in memory of her friend.”

“In
memory
?” Mazzy said. “Is he dead?”

“See,” Gabe answered, “that’s the thing…”

They hung on Gabe’s words like climbers dangling from a cliff—as if a simple blink would plunge them into an abyss where they’d never learn the truth.

When Gabe finished, Mazzy and Seth stared again at Elyse’s illustration of the Hunter, digesting the details. “So strange,” said Seth, after a few seconds. “He looks exactly how we imagined him.”

“My grandmother had the idea that maybe David had seen this book somewhere,” said Gabe. “The town library maybe. She thought he’d lifted his version of the legend directly from this page and used it to create a game. The game that he shared with you. The game that you shared with me.”

“Sounds like a virus,” Seth said, and shuddered.

Mazzy plucked nervously at her bedspread. “Gabe also said his grandmother wondered if maybe something out in those woods had planted a seed in Mason’s head. And the seed sprouted into the stories that Mason wrote down.” The group paused, trying collectively to nullify years of being told that such things were impossible. “Let’s throw reality out the window for a few minutes,” Mazzy went on. “Just
suppose
that fifty years ago, some sort of mysterious entity gave Mason the idea for the Hunter legend.” The boys scoffed, and Mazzy raised a hand. “Hear me out. When Mason transcribed the stories, something happened to allow the entity to materialize. To live. On the night his aunt found the mutilated rooster, the entity…took Mason away.”

“And a couple years ago,” Gabe added, “David might have found a copy of this book in the library. When he started playing his game, that same entity returned…” His curious expression fell away as a hard realization took its place.

“…to take David away too,” Mazzy finished. She glanced at Seth, who seemed fascinated by the floor.

“We played the game, just like David did.” Gabe felt the blood rush from his face. “And now things have been happening to us.”

Seth tore the pillow out from beneath him and threw it against the wall, where it hit with a pathetic whoomp. “No!” he said. “I won’t believe it. David ran away. All the rest of it’s not…It’s just not…” He closed his eyes, letting out a long breath.

“We’re only talking,” Mazzy said, sliding off her bed next to him. She squeezed his shoulder. “There’s got to be a logical explanation.”

“Oh yeah?” Seth asked, raising his voice. “Stories that travel like viruses? Monsters that set traps to catch children for supper? Beasts that creep into our bedrooms at night? You mean logical explanations like those?”

“There has to be an explanation, even if it isn’t logical,” Gabe answered. “I brought this book here today to show you what I learned. To tell you what my grandmother told me. Something is not right in Slade. It’s not just a story.” Gabe reached into his backpack and removed the bull’s-eye map of Slade. “No one but us wants to see the truth. If there is something supernatural occurring in this town and in our woods,
we
might be the only ones insane enough to end it.”

Seth and Mazzy flinched. “Insane?” Mazzy asked.

“I only mean, we have the
imagination
to look for answers where anyone else would stop.” Gabe nodded at the book on the floor. “Just like Nathaniel Olmstead.”
And Leesy Temple,
he thought. He turned the pages, revealing more and more monsters, folktales, and fantasies. “My grandmother said that Nathaniel was a little bit crazy himself. He believed his monsters were real, that he’d fought against them with talismans. He’d discovered the monsters’ weaknesses: the same sorts of everyday objects his characters used to survive.”

“Okay,” said Mazzy. “So then our first task is to figure out
our
talisman.” She flicked on the lamp next to her bed. Until then, none of them had noticed how dark the room had become.

“No,” said Seth. “What we need to do first is figure out what we’re dealing with.” He ran his finger along the spine of the big book on the floor, as if his touch might extract the answer.

“Why don’t we start with Seth’s family?” Mazzy suggested. “Your cousin Mason lived in your barn. His awful aunt and uncle were your great-grandparents.” Seth stiffened. This connection had not yet occurred to him. “Verna was there when Mason disappeared,” she went on. “And she might have been the only one who had a clue where he’d gone. Or
if
he’d gone.”

“But she died years ago,” said Gabe.

“I’ll check at home anyway,” said Seth. “See if there’s anything about my family lying around.”

Gabe picked up his grandmother’s book and held it in his lap. “We also have pages of possible answers right here too. I can glance through it again tonight. How about I bring the book to school tomorrow? We’ll settle down somewhere and catch up.”

“But I’m still suspended for the chocolate cake thing,” said Seth. “Unfairly, I might add. I can’t set foot inside school for another few days.”

Gabe sighed. “After school it is, then.”

“We’re going to need some time to go through everything,” said Mazzy. “Where will we be able to do that?”

“My house isn’t good,” said Gabe, remembering his mother’s warning to stay away from Seth.

“What about Seth’s house?” said Mazzy.

But Seth shook his head. “My mom’s definitely not going to want us traipsing through her beloved hellhole.”

“What about back here?” Gabe asked. “It worked well today.”

As if in response, there was a knock on the door. “Mazzy? Who are you talking to?”

Wide-eyed, Mazzy scrambled to stand up. She tucked her long hair behind her ears. Gesturing for the boys to remain silent, she tiptoed to the door and opened it a crack. “It’s just the radio, Mom.”

But Mrs. Lerman pushed at the door and Mazzy skidded on
the carpet. The door swung open. “I cannot believe you,” said Mrs. Lerman. She stood in the hall, hands on her hips. “Lying to my face?” She pointed at the boys sitting on the floor, then flicked her thumb toward the stairs. “You two are welcome to come back when my daughter learns to ask permission.”

THE NEXT MORNING, Slade Middle School was abuzz with excitement. The final event of the week had been arranged to occur later that evening, on Halloween night.

The high school sat upon a hill adjacent to the middle school. Working together, the student governments of the upper and lower schools had organized a “haunted house” in the high school gymnasium. Students and faculty had constructed a labyrinth of corridors and chambers, each room populated with various horrors. Black-lit ghosts hovered on fishing line. Plastic snakes and bugs fell from above. Volunteers dressed in ghoulish costumes jumped out from hidden partitions.

The haunting was a town tradition and the school’s biggest moneymaker of the year. People came from all over the eastern part of the state to experience the frights of Slade High’s ghostly gym. And according to the senior-class president, who’d been interviewed in the local newspaper that day, this year’s spook show might just be their best yet.

Lacking other options, Gabe figured the event was the perfect spot to meet.

Gabe passed through the rest of the day with a knot in his stomach. After his grandmother had picked him up from the Lermans’ the night before, he’d told her about their discussion. Elyse agreed that he might find some answers in the mythology book. She promised that she was still thinking about what to do.

He ate lunch in the cafeteria with Felicia and Ingrid and Malcolm, if only to keep up the appearance that everything was
okay. Felicia was her usual outspoken self, talking up her costume for that evening. She was going as Maleficent from Disney’s
Sleeping Beauty
.

Malcolm and Ingrid oohed and aahed like good little worker bees, but Gabe simply smiled, half listening. He kept thinking about the Olmstead and Ashe book. During his research, one entry in particular had stuck out, and he couldn’t wait to discuss it with his friends.

After the last bell, Gabe called Temple House to remind his family about the fright fest at the high school. After listening to his grandmother’s stern warning to “be careful,” he trekked up the path to the other campus with Mazzy.

The light was low in the sky, the air crisp. The scent of burning leaves drifted on the breeze. Young children dressed in colorful costumes were accompanied by tired-looking parents through the front door of the high school, carrying bags and satchels and jack-o’-lantern-shaped buckets they hoped to later fill up with candy.

Gabe and Mazzy had been sitting on the low wall outside the entrance for several minutes when an odd figure approached them. His thin frame was bulked up by a suit of plastic armor under which he wore a dark sweatshirt and a pair of dirty jeans. A red cape hung from his shoulders and a centurion’s helmet hid his face, a Mohawk of synthetic hair rising from the top of it like a horse’s mane. In his belt was tucked a long wooden sword, painted silver. “I figured if we’re gonna be fighting monsters,” Seth’s slightly muffled voice came from the helmet, “at least one of us should gear up.”

“We’re not fighting monsters,” said Gabe. “We’re just talking about what to do.”

“Same thing at this point,” Seth answered. From inside the helmet, he flashed some teeth. It was the first time Gabe had seen Seth smile in at least a month.

“Okay,” said Mazzy, “but just to be sure, this isn’t part of your game, right?”

Seth glanced at his costume. “This? No way. A Robber Prince would never wear something so obvious.” He knocked the sword against his helmet. “I’m just being cautious in case one of the faculty recognizes me. Don’t want to risk getting sent home, right?”

“I guess that makes sense,” said Gabe, holding back a smile. “Come on. Let’s head inside.”