2 A Haunting In Oregon (12 page)

“Must have been around midnight,”
Roy said, recalling the interaction. “Why, has he seen him?”

“He says it was around midnight,
Pete,” Steven said back into the phone. “Well, good luck with that. We’re
making progress here and we’ll give you an update soon. Hang in there.” Steven
hung up.

“Has he seen him?” Roy asked
again.

“No, but he wants to,” Steven
said. “He made friends with a pretty woman in the gazebo, and now he’s
interested in meeting the cordial ones before we turn them all off. He remembered
Dennington from your description of him at breakfast that one morning. Now he
wants to get to know him!”

“Well, at least it gives him
something to do,” Roy said.

“On the other hand,” Steven said,
“Sarah is still terrified. She stays locked in her room all night.”

“Poor thing,” Roy replied. “She
should come out and enjoy herself.”

They drove in silence a little
ways further until Steven recognized a marker he’d noted the night before.

“That split tree, there,” he said,
pointing over the hill to their left. “That’s it. We need to walk over that
hill.”

Steven pulled the car to the side
of the road. The road was small and quiet; they had passed only one other car
while on it. They walked over to a fence and Steven held open the barbed wire
for Roy to bend under, then Roy returned the favor.

They walked over the hill until
they reached the clearing.

“Yes,” Roy said, “this is it.
Let’s move as close to it as we can get.”

They positioned themselves based
on their memory from the previous night. Steven slipped into the River, but was
unable to see the barrier. He tried feeling for it, but nothing registered.

“Don’t feel bad,” Roy said.
“They’re hard enough to detect at night, let alone during the daylight. I’m
going to have to trance to find it. You hold the mirror right there. I’ll be
right back.”

Roy sat cross-legged on the ground
and wrapped the blindfold around his eyes. Steven stood above him, holding the
mirror at the angle Roy had identified. Several minutes went by. Steven became
aware of how strange they must look if anyone happened to see them.

Roy emerged from the flow and
stood up, removing the blindfold. “All right, I think I have it.” Steven
lowered the mirror. Roy took a small notepad from his shirt pocket and sketched
a few lines. “Let’s go!”

They walked back to the car and
got in.

“Do you have any reception here?”
Roy asked Steven.

Steven checked his phone. “No, no
bars,” he said. “Let’s drive back towards town.”

After several minutes of driving,
Steven checked his phone again. Two bars appeared. “Here you go,” he said,
handing the phone to Roy. Roy dialed Dixon and they chatted. Roy described the
pattern. Then there was a long wait.

“He’s looking,” Roy said to
Steven. “He’s got these patterns all drawn out, he’s trying to find a match.”

Dixon came back on the line, and
Roy started writing down information. “Got it, yes,” Roy said to Dixon on the
phone. “Thank you for all your help with this Dixon. Yes. Oh, would you? Yes,
we’ll head there now. Yes, I’ll let you know.” Then he hung up.

“Her name is Eliza Winters. And
she lives right in Clearlake.”

“Well,” Steven said, “that’s
convenient! At least we don’t have to go to another state.”

“I suspect,” Roy said, handing the
phone back to Steven, “living inside the barrier makes it easier for her to
maintain. It’ll be interesting to see what she has to say.”

“Do you have an address for her?”
Steven asked.

“Right here,” Roy said,
brandishing the notepad.

“I’d have you enter it into my
phone for directions,” Steven said, “but I know that’s not going to happen.”

“Damn right it isn’t,” said Roy.
“That thing is for calling. Why does it have to be for anything else?”

“Show me the address,” Steven
said. Roy held the address up for Steven to read. Then he said to Roy, “Watch
this!”

He pressed a button on his phone,
and spoke into it: “Directions to 480 East Wilson Street, Clearlake,
California.”

“Getting directions to 480 East
Wilson Street” came the reply back from the phone. Then it said, “Head north
for eighteen miles, then turn right onto East Main street.” Steven beamed at
Roy.

“Well, I’ll be goddamned!” Roy
said. “Does it wipe your ass, too?”

Eliza’s house looked like a
mansion, albeit a run-down one. The exterior wood was exposed over most of the
house, leaving a weather-beaten look. It stood three stories high and had
beautiful bay windows masked from the inside by tightly drawn blinds.

Steven and Roy walked through the
front yard. There were large, overgrown bushes that needed tending and the lawn
was three weeks past its expiration date. Once they walked up onto the porch,
they saw the front door was open behind a screen door. They could hear the
sounds of a video game coming from beyond.

Steven knocked on the door.

“Mom!” a child yelled from inside.

They knocked again. “Mom!” came
the reply.

“Hello!” Steven said through the
screen. “Is anyone home?”

They heard the sounds of the game
abruptly stop and a boy of about ten walked around a corner and to the door.

“Hello?” he said sheepishly.

“We’re looking for Eliza Winters,”
Roy asked.

The boy turned and walked down a
hallway out of sight. In the distance they heard him yell again, “Mom!” and
then he turned and walked back into the room he came from. The explosions of
the video game resumed.

A woman appeared, walking down the
hallway toward the door. She was large framed. Her hair was long and wild,
swirling around her head as she walked, creating a sense of chaos that Steven
found disarming. As she approached the door and Steven saw her features, his
alarm subsided. She had a soft countenance and her blue eyes were alive, moving
rapidly, taking them in. He liked her instantly.

“You must be Roy,” she said,
opening the screen door. “Please come in. Forgive my son for not asking you in.
I assure you he’s been taught the proper way to greet guests but he chooses to
forget, something I will remind him about after you leave. And you are?”

“This is my son Steven,” Roy said.

She extended her hand. “Eliza
Winters, how nice to meet you.” Her voice had a lilt and charm that Steven
found mesmerizing. He felt he could listen to it forever.

“Nice to meet you too,” he said
back to her.

“Please, have a seat, I’ll be
right back,” she said, and turned to leave the room. They could overhear her
speaking with the boy and the sound from the video game diminished by half. She
came back a few minutes later with a pitcher of iced tea and three glasses.

“I just made this when Dixon
called,” she said, pouring them each a glass, “so it’s fresh. Nothing worse
than old tea. Dixon is such a cute old man, I just think the world of him.”

Steven thought of the girls on the
boat in Ballard, and wondered if Eliza had slept with Dixon.

“No, I haven’t slept with him,”
she said, “though I might if the opportunity presented itself. He is so charming,
the little rascal.”

Steven looked away from her, embarrassed.
Can she read my thoughts?
he wondered.

“I can’t read all thoughts,
Steven,” she said, “just the strong ones. And since men think about sex on
average once every seven seconds, you were easy. I’ll bet you take sugar with
your tea,” she said, scooping some sugar with a long spoon and handing the
glass to Steven.

“Yes, I do,” Steven said, taking
the glass, “And I thought that was a myth. The seven seconds thing.”

“Not in my experience. And you
Roy? No sugar for you, am I right?”

“You are indeed!” Roy said. He
seemed as delighted with her as Steven.

“Well then,” she said, taking a
glass for herself and leaning back in her chair, “I hope this hits the spot for
you. Trancing around in fields probably worked up a thirst.”

“Dixon told you?” Roy asked.

“No, I saw it,” she said. “As soon
as you tranced right next to it, alarms went off here. That’s a cute little
blindfold you use!” she said, smiling and pointing at him. Roy blushed.

“Well,” Steven said, “I hope you
don’t think we were trying to mess with it in any way.”

“Oh no,” she said. “Until Dixon
called I was concerned, but he wouldn’t have sent you to me if you weren’t good
people. Why don’t you tell me why you were trying to find me?”

Roy took another sip of the tea
and sat his glass down. “Well,” he said, “we were hoping to find out why you
have the barrier in the first place.”

“There are several reasons for the
barrier,” she replied. “Some of it I can talk about, and some of it I can’t.
Maybe if you could tell me why you’re interested, I could decide how much I can
tell.”

“Fair enough,” Roy said. “Do you
know Jurgen?”

She nodded.

“It’s a long story as to why, but
he wants us to mark a grave not far from here.”

She leaned forward in her chair.
“Does he? That little bugger!”

“Yes,” Steven jumped in, “and we
thought we’d find out more about why he’s barred from the area before we
proceed.”

“You haven’t marked it yet?” she
asked.

“No,” said Roy. “I don’t trust
Jurgen farther than I can throw him. We told him we’d do it to get him to stop
tormenting some people we’re trying to help. But before we actually do it, I
want to know why he wants it.”

Eliza eyed them both for a minute
before she spoke.

“OK,” she said, “I’m gonna tell
you. Because Dixon vouched for you, and I believe your story. But this cannot
go past this room, and I want a blood oath from both of you before I do.”

“OK,” Roy said.

“Yours or mine?” she asked.

“Yours,” Roy said. “I didn’t bring
one.”

Eliza stood and walked to the
mantle of the fireplace. There was a small box made of marble. She opened it
and withdrew a knife. She handed it to Roy.

Roy took the blade and ran it
against the palm of his left hand. Then he raised his hand and looked at Eliza.
“I swear an elemental oath that the information you share with me I will not share
with anyone, except Steven here, without your consent.”

He handed the knife to Steven. “Do
the same thing,” he instructed.

“Uh,” Steven said, unsure if he
wanted to proceed. He looked up at Roy, and then at Eliza.

“Never taken an elemental oath before?”
she asked.

“He’s new,” Roy said. “In
training.”

“I see,” she said. “Well, Steven,
are you going to keep what I share with you private?”

“Yes,” he said.

“Then take the oath. As your
father did.”

“I’m not sure that I know what it
means,” Steven said. “And I’d like to know what I’m agreeing to.”

“That’s smart,” she said. “You are
wise to ask. It means that I will have confidence that you will honor the oath.
Because if you do not, you will have already given us permission to turn your
blood to fire and your flesh to stone. That’s allegory of course; you’re
basically giving us permission to kill you if you break the oath. So be sure.”

“I will not tell anyone,” he said,
holding the knife.

“Then what are you waiting for?”
she asked.

He looked at the knife, expecting
to see Roy’s blood, but none was there.

“It’s a special knife,” Eliza
said. “It consecrates the oath.”

Steven ran the blade against his
left palm. It stung, and blood began to drip from his hand. He spoke the same
words he had heard Roy say, then lowered his hand. Once he was done, the sting
was gone. He looked at his hand and there was no cut. He rubbed the spot with
his right hand to be sure.

Eliza held out her hand for the
knife. Steven handed it back to her. She returned it to the box on the mantle.

“You’ll want to be sure your boy
doesn’t get into that box,” Steven said with a laugh.

“It doesn’t open for him,” she
said, returning to her seat.

Steven adjusted uncomfortably in
his seat.

“I told you there are multiple
reasons for the barrier,” she began. “That’s true. The first reason is to keep
scavengers like Jurgen out. Whenever we run across someone of his kind, we add
them to the barred list. There’s eight or nine people barred. Several species
of creatures, too. We don’t want them anywhere around here so we just keep them
out altogether.

“But we can’t keep out everyone.
So the second reason for the barrier is a demarcation. The entire area inside
the barrier is protected.”

“Oh?” Roy said. “Protected how?”

“Artifacts move. When someone digs
for one, it moves down in the earth. Slips away from them before they can reach
it. You and I would know they’re moving, but the average person digging in the
ground never sees anything. That’s how we keep them buried and in this area.”

“Is there a third reason?” Steven
asked.

“That’s the most serious reason,
and it’s the reason for the oath. We have a demon buried here.”

Roy didn’t say anything. It
clicked for Steven.

“That’s what he’s after. Wow,
Jurgen is really an asshole!” Steven said. “Excuse my French.”

“Do you know where it’s buried?”
Roy asked.

“If I did, I couldn’t tell you,”
she said. “That’s tightly guarded.”

“Do you think Jurgen knows where it’s
buried?” Roy asked Eliza.

“I would find that hard to
believe,” she replied. “In four hundred years only a handful of people know the
exact location.”

“That’s how long it’s been
buried?” Steven asked.

“Yes,” she said, “and we take our
responsibility to keep it buried seriously. That demon was one of the worst to
ever walk the earth. Even its remains in the ground pollute things around here.
That’s one of the reasons we don’t like artifacts being dug up.”

“I’m guessing he would be able to
sell it for a lot of money?” Steven asked.

“I would think he’d grind it up,”
Roy said. “I imagine as an ingredient he make far more off it.”

“A spoonful would be worth
millions to certain people,” Eliza said. “It would also cause immense misery. We’ll
never let it be dug up. It’s staying in the ground.”

“What are we going to do?” Steven
asked. “We’re at a dead end here. Go back to Jurgen? We took an oath, we can’t
tell him what we know! We’ve boxed ourselves in.”

“I suspect,” Roy said, “that even
if we’d gone to that grave and tried to mark it, I would have detected
something was very wrong with it.”

“You wouldn’t have gotten within a
hundred yards of it,” Eliza said. “It’s heavily monitored.”

“Why would Jurgen send us to mark
a grave we wouldn’t be able to get to?” Roy asked. “Do you think he just
stumbled across coordinates and doesn’t know what they are?”

“Coordinates?” Eliza asked. “He
gave you specific coordinates?”

“Yes,” Steven said, looking for
the paper with the coordinates in his pocket. “He said the grave would be
somewhere near them. Not precise, but close. He said we’d have to narrow it
down on our own, then mark it.” Steven handed the paper to Eliza.

“Eew,” she scrunched up her nose.
“Did he write this?”

“Yes,” said Roy.

“It stinks!” she said, looking it
over.

“Funny,” Steven said, “I didn’t
notice a smell.”

“I’m sensitive to bad odors,” she
said, holding it at arm’s length. She studied it for a second, then handed it
back.

“That’s not it,” she said, taking
a drink of iced tea.

“Not it?” Steven asked. “Not the
location of the demon’s grave?”

“I can’t say any more than that,”
she said. “But it’s a relief.”

“So he’s sent us after some other
grave?” Roy asked. “There has to be something special about it, he wouldn’t
send us to mark a normal grave in a barred area when he can find plenty in
areas he
can
access.”

“Unless his goal was to discover
you by tracking us,” Steven said, indicating Eliza.

“I’m easily discovered,” Eliza
said. “I’m in the directory. The signature’s there for everyone to see. And the
house is protected. Anything said inside cannot be detected outside.”

“Perhaps he intends to press us
for information, since we’ve visited with you,” Steven said.

“What do you know?” she said.
“Even if he tortures you, which he won’t, you don’t know the location of the
demon. The most you could give up is its existence. And you won’t do that,
because it would mean your death.”

“I don’t think that was his
intent,” Roy said. “I don’t think he knows anything about the demon here. I
think there’s something about that grave that interests him, and he wants it.”

“And I,” Eliza said, “of course,
cannot allow him to dig it up if it’s inside the barrier. If you mark it, we’ll
stop whoever he sends in to obtain it.”

“If we mark it, we’ll be able to
call our end of the deal done, regardless,” Steven said.

“No,” Roy said, “I know him. If he
doesn’t get that body – or whatever is in that grave – he will
not
consider the deal done. He’s slimy that way. He’ll keep tormenting Pete and
Sarah until he gets something that he feels compensates him for the closure of
the portal.”

“Sounds like you’ve been on quite
an adventure, boys,” Eliza said. “Here, have another glass of tea. I want to
hear all about it.”

Roy and Steven took turns telling
the events of the past week to Eliza. She listened carefully, occasionally
asking questions and getting them to clarify things. When it was over she
leaned back in her chair and sighed.

“That is one hell of a story,” she
said. The clock on the mantle chimed once. “And look, it’s an hour past lunch
time. You’ll both stay?”

Steven and Roy looked at each other.
“If it’s not an imposition,” Steven offered.

“I’d be offended if you didn’t,”
Eliza said, taking them both back into the kitchen, where she began to fix
sandwiches and refilled their iced tea glasses for the third time. They chatted
about the area and how long she’d had the house, if she was married (she
wasn’t) and how many kids she had (the one boy). When the sandwiches were ready,
she went into the video game room and they heard the sounds stop.