Crimson Falls (The Depravity Chronicles) (28 page)

Everyone looked
at Anna. “We can’t turn back now, we’ve come too far. We need to end this, and
the only way we can do that is to face this Wendigo creature.”

Anish nodded,
along with Matthew.

“There are too
many of us down here,” Anna continued. She turned to Tim, Geraldine, Aaron, and
David. “I need you guys to go back up into the house. It is easier to pick us
off when we’re all standing here.”

“How do you
figure?” Tim asked. “It’s better if we’re in a group.”

“No, Anna is
right,” Anish interrupted. “It is too fast and there are too many of us. We
stand a better chance in smaller groups.”

Anna could tell
that Tim didn’t agree, but he did as he was told. Taking his group with him,
Anna turned toward where Jake’s head had been tossed at them.

“What now,
boss?” Sam asked.

“We follow the
trail,” she said simply. They moved forward, hearing splashes of water every
few seconds.

“It doesn’t
sound too close,” Trevor said, his Beretta in his right hand. He looked at
Anna. “Why didn’t you send me with Tim?”

“Good question,”
Anna responded. Truth be told, she felt that he and Simon would be safer with
her. Although they were probably going to come face to face with the demon, she
wanted him close by. Plus, he knew more about what they were fighting than she
did. Perhaps it was time to trust her son and his best friend.

* * * * * *

3

“I can’t believe
Jake’s dead,” Geraldine said as they walked back toward the wine cellar.

“I certainly
can,” David answered. “He was an idiot.”

Tim choked back
a frightened laugh. “Well, regardless, we need to get back to the main house
and out of this tunnel.”

“I’ll second
that,” Aaron said.

Tim felt
somewhat confident that the Wendigo, whatever that meant, was not going to
chase them. If anything, it would be hunting Anna and her group. They were,
after all, the ones that were on their way to kill it.

“So is anyone
else a little freaked out by what they were talking about?” Aaron asked. “I
mean, a demon, really?”

“Really,” David
said matter-of-factly. “I always knew they existed.”

“So Michael was
right,” Geraldine said.

“Not exactly,”
David corrected. “A Wendigo isn’t a vampire. It’s a demon.”

“I thought
vampires were demons?” Aaron said. “Shit, I can’t believe I’m even having this
conversation.”

“Believe it,”
Tim said. “Yes, it defies logic. But this whole freaking day defies logic,
doesn’t it?”

Tim was relieved
to see the ladder that led back into the cellar. Just as the relief washed over
him, he heard them.

Splash!

Splash!

Thud!

Thud!

“Oh my God!”
Geraldine shouted. “That’s the same sounds we heard earlier tonight!”

The group stood
still, waiting for the next sound. Tim knew the splashes were immediately in
front of them. He wondered how it was possible that the demon could have been
on both sides of the two groups, since Jake’s head had been thrown at them from
the opposite direction they were traveling.

As Tim looked at
David, he saw large, bony fingers creep across his neck. With a horrid twist,
David’s head was turned a full 180 degrees.

“Mother of God!”
Geraldine cried. She grabbed the ladder and began climbing it. Then Tim saw it
lurch forward to grab her. He shot it three times directly in the chest.

Pow! Pow! Pow!

The demon fell
backward, shrieking as it did so. Tim almost dropped his gun to cover his ears.
So much for small groups,
he thought to himself.

Aaron then stood
over it and unloaded his chamber into the Wendigo. Unfortunately, he hadn’t
shot it in the head.

“Aaron, don’t
get so close to it!” Tim yelled, but it was too late. The creature reached up
with its long arms, grabbed Aaron’s hands, and jerked him onto the ground. It
quickly got on top of Aaron and bit deeply into his neck. Blood squirted in all
directions, gushing from Aaron’s wound.

Tim walked up to
it, put the gun to its head, and pulled the trigger.

Click
.

To Tim’s horror,
the gun didn’t shoot. The Wendigo turned his head toward Tim, smiled broadly,
and seized the gun from his grasp. As quickly as he could, Tim reached for a
second, smaller gun he hid in his jacket. By the time he could reach it,
however, it was too late. The creature had a hold of his neck.

Pow!

Pow!

Geraldine was
shooting from above, and it struck the demon’s shoulder. It fell backward
again, so Tim used the opportunity given to him and took out his other gun. He
emptied it into the demon’s face. He began to feel lightheaded, so he climbed
the ladder as quickly as he could. Convinced the demon was dead, he collapsed
onto the floor beside Geraldine in the wine cellar.

“Tim, my God,
Tim,” Geraldine cried. “Your neck.”

Tim felt even
more dizzy than he had. He lifted his arm to touch his neck, but his arm seemed
incredibly heavy. It was almost like he had a twenty pound weight tied to his
wrists. He touched his neck, which was wet. Pain suddenly ripped through his
upper body, especially the bottom of his neck. When he looked at his hand, it
was covered with blood.

“What the hell?”
he asked, but even before he finished speaking he knew he was about to faint.

“Tim, Jesus!”
Geraldine cried. Even though she was right in front of him, her voice seemed
distant and it echoed distantly in his ears. Tim could now feel the blood
pouring from his neck, drenching his jacket and the shirt underneath it. He
grabbed his neck again, thinking perhaps he could stop the bleeding.

The last image
Tim saw was Geraldine screaming and the demon’s head emerging from the drain.

* * * * * *

4

Anna heard the
distant sound of gunshots. She wondered if she had made the right choice,
breaking into two groups.

“Do not doubt
your decision,” Anish said, as if reading her mind again. “There is no easy way
to eliminate a Wendigo.”

“I just hope
they’re okay,” she said.

“Look, straight
ahead,” Sam said. “Trevor, you got any flares left?”

“No, I dropped
the bags way back close to the wine cellar.”

“I do,” Simon
said. He pulled a gun from his pants and two flares from his jacket. Jake
reached out with his hand, gesturing for Simon to hand them over.

“It is premature
to shoot a flare at this point,” Anish said. “We will need them.”

Sam ignored
Anish.

Whoosh!

The flare sailed
through the tunnel and hit a dirt wall approximately twenty feet in front of
them.

“Jesus, Sam,”
Anna said. “What good did that do?”

Sam walked ahead
of the group and stopped in front of the wall. “Buck stops here.”

“Damn,” Anna
said as she joined him. She looked up and saw nothing. “How could this just
end?”

“It is an
illusion,” Anish said as he approached them. He turned toward the wall on his
right and placed his hands on it, closing his eyes.

“Gitche Manitou,
baakaakosin,” Anish said. He repeated it twice more. To everyone’s shock, the wall
in front of him vanished, revealing a large room. Anish stood to the side and
nodded for everyone to enter.

Anna was going
to ask what he had said, but figured it must have been magic. She was fine with
not knowing. A terrible stench struck them the moment Anish removed the wall.
The space was not unlike where they had found the demonic paraphernalia where
Michael had been chained. There was a large beam, and attached to them were
several more chains and shackles.

There were a few
significant differences. In the corner of the room was a rotting pile of
carcasses. Some were animals, and Anna swore she saw a few human body parts as
well. Bones littered the ground, making it almost impossible to see the dirt
floor. Anna breathed through her mouth, trying to avoid the smell. But even her
taste buds were affected by the aroma in the air. 

“Holy shit,”
Trevor gasped. “Looks like we found the Wendigo’s hangout.”

“Indeed,” Anish
agreed.

“What now?”
Simon asked.

“We wait,” Anish
answered.

“What do you
mean, ‘we wait’?” Amy asked.

“The creature
will return,” Anish explained. “He does not fear us. This has been his haven for
quite some time. He will not advocate his lair without a fight.”

“HELP ME! HELP
ME!”
Tim’s
voice cried in the distance. They could also hear the sounds of splashing
water.

Sam moved toward
the door, but Anish grabbed his arm and stopped him dead in his tracks.

“There is
nothing you can do,” Anish said flatly.

“I’m not going
to just let him die!” Sam cried.

“What makes you
think it’s Tim?” Trevor asked. “Ten bucks says it’s the Wendigo.”

Thud!

Thud!

Anna quickly
looked up at the dirt ceiling, half expecting the demon to jump on her from
above.

“It’s coming
from up there,” Amy said.

“
My God! Please!
HELP!”
Tim’s voice screamed again.

“I can’t stand
this!” Amy suddenly screamed. Her glasses fell from her face, and as Sam moved
back across the room he stepped on them. Everyone shuddered at the sound of the
crunching glass.

“Oh, shit,” Sam
said softly. “I’m so sorry.”

Without warning,
everyone’s flashlights flickered, then turned off, leaving the group in total
darkness.

The sound of
raspy breathing filled with the room, followed by a shrill laugh.

“Who wants to
play with me?” said the voice of a small child.

Matthew began to
pray loudly as clawed hands slid down his body.

Anna shivered as
she felt someone – or something – breathing down her neck. An awful crunching sound
echoed through the room. Anna was sure it wasn’t Amy’s glasses again.

“Please tell me
someone accidentally stepped on something,” Simon said.

Another sadistic
laugh filled the room, trailing off with the sound of the footsteps running from
down the passageway. The flashlights regained their strength, revealing a
terrifying scene.

“Fuck!” Trevor
hollered.

Pastor Amy Adler
was lying on the floor, her neck twisted and broken.

“What the hell?”
Sam asked, turning in different directions trying to find the killer.

“How could this
have happened?” Anna demanded.

“It is cunning
and calculating,” Anish said. He reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out
a large, brass pendant decorated with multiple phases of the moon. Anish held
it in his hands and began chanting rhythmically. As he did, small spheres of
white light illuminated the room.

Matthew broke
his silence, turning to Anish with an angry expression. “We could have used
that a few minutes ago,” Matthew said scornfully to Anish.

“I know,” Anish
said apologetically. “But we can be sure the Wendigo cannot extinguish this
light.”

“How are you
doing that?” Trevor asked, still trying to avoid looking at the dead body
across the small room.

“I am harboring
the energy of the moon.”

Anna looked at
Amy’s body, shaking her head as she thought of the many people who had died in
a single day.

With the silver
light of the moons dancing above their heads, the group waited for the Wendigo
to return home.

1

Anna was
astonished by the buzzing of the magic in the air. Against the thick dampness
and stench in the air, the light seemed surreal.

Trevor and Simon
were both thinking the same thing. The Wendigo must have crawled along the
walls, dropped down quietly with its legs wrapped around the beams above,
snapped the woman’s neck, then made a perfect getaway.

Matthew was
trying to hold back the waves of guilt he felt for brining Amy with him on his
crusade. He knew she had not been prepared to face such evil. But if he wanted
to survive this ordeal, he needed to deal with his shit and push away any
emotion that could only compromise his mind.

Thud!

Thud!

“Shit!” Sam
yelled, his voice cracking.

Splash!

Splash!

“Look out!”
Trevor yelled to his mother. Anna whipped around, just in time to avoid being
sliced by the long fingers of her missing husband.

“What the fuck
is going on here?” Anna hollered, her fear being replaced by anger and the need
to protect Trevor and Simon.

“That is not
your husband,” Matthew whispered.

“Ya think?” Anna
shot back. She lifted her Beretta and didn’t blink. She shot the image of her
husband directly between the eyes. The Wendigo fell to the ground. It began to
change shape, growing larger and thinner at the same time. Bones crunched, dark
liquid oozed from its multiple wounds. It began to shriek so loudly that
Matthew put his hands to his ears.

Quick as
lightening, Anna knelt to the ground and placed the nozzle of the gun to the
side of the Wendigo’s head. She fired three times. Pieces of skull, brain, and
dark blood showered everyone in the room. She reached into her belt and pulled
a knife with a six inch blade. Without flinching, Anna began to cut off the
Wendigo’s head.

“Jesus Christ,
Mom!” Trevor yelled.

“She’s doing
what she must,” Anish commented coolly.

“Just cut off
the head,” Matthew said. “Then we can take it to the cemetery, dismember it,
and bury the pieces.” He looked at Anish, who nodded in agreement.

As Anna
continued to slice through the Wendigo, Trevor and Simon knelt beside her in
case it sprung back to life.

Matthew stared
at Amy’s broken body, tears filling his eyes. In his experience exorcising
demons, he never anticipated that a loved one would lose her life in the
struggle.

“People often
have difficulty knowing how to react to such violence,” Anish said as he put
his hand on Matthew’s shoulder.

“Not that I’m
complaining,” Simon said as he stood up and joined them. “But doesn’t this seem
a bit anticlimactic? I mean, why didn’t it kill us when it had the chance?”

“Yeah,” Trevor
echoed. “It could have killed us all, not just Amy. You never would have had
time to do that fancy moon thing.”

“I do not think
it anticipated my manipulation of energy,” Anish noted.

“If you weren’t
here, we would all be dead,” Anna said without looking up. “We owe you a great
debt of gratitude.”

“What now?”
Simon asked, embarrassed that he was repeating himself.

Anna looked at
the body of the Wendigo. “We get out of here and back into the main house,”
Anna said, a bit of authority returning to her voice.

Matthew nodded
in agreement. “Then we bury the Wendigo on the church’s property. It’s late
enough that no one will hear us or notice.”

Anish and
Matthew grabbed the Wendigo’s legs, preparing to drag it back to the house.
Anna picked up the severed head, then looked at Amy’s body.

“I’ve got it,”
Sam said. He hoisted Amy’s body over his shoulder. “Let’s go.”

As they walked
out of the small room, Jake’s body was lying in the water. Anna looked solemnly
at it, wondering how they could transport his body to the cellar.

“We’ve got it,”
Simon offered. Trevor looked at him, then Simon slapped him in the back of the
head.

“Yeah, yeah,
we’ve got it,” Trevor stuttered.

“I’m sorry,”
Anna said to the teenagers who had seen too much. “But we only have so many
hands. I don’t know how Tim and the others made out, but I doubt it’s good
news. And only God knows where the hell Lionel’s body is.”

When they
reached the opening and the rope they had climbed down, Trevor was the first to
speak. “We’re going to have to go to the wine cellar. We can’t hoist all this
shit up on the rope.”

Anna agreed. The
group made their way toward the cellar, half expecting something to attack
them. When they reached the ladder that led to the house, they found the bodies
of David and Aaron.

“Sweet Jesus,”
Anna said.

“I need to bless
them,” Matthew said, then shrugged. “I know, we have things to do. But this
needs to be done.”

“I agree,” Anish
said.

As Matthew
performed last rites, Anna thought she heard something above them.

Thud!

Thud!

“You’ve got to
be fucking joking!” Simon yelled.

“Anna? Anna are
you there?” a voice called from above.

“Do you think
there could be more than one Wendigo?” Anna asked Anish.

“I don’t know,”
he said matter-of-factly. It was not the answer she wanted to hear.

Suddenly a face
appeared above them. It was Geraldine.

“Oh, thank God!”
Geraldine shouted. “I didn’t know whether I should run to my car, or stay
here.” She was borderline hysterical.

“It’s okay,
Geraldine. Just stay there, we’re on our way up. Here, I need your help.” Anna
took the Wendigo’s head and lifted it up to Geraldine, who took it without
complaint.

When Matthew had
finished, he turned to Anish. “I will climb the ladder, then reach down and
help you bring the Wendigo and the other bodies into the cellar.

“I can help,
too,” Sam said.

“Thanks,”
Geraldine said. She was feeling better now that she felt safe. The group worked
together to hoist the bodies into the wine cellar, then up the stairs and into
the kitchen.

Anna grabbed her
radio.

“Janet, come in,
Janet.”

“Sheriff? Oh,
Anna! Thank God!”

“Is everything
okay there, Janet?” Anna asked, praying her other two children were safe.

“Everything is
fine. We’re scared shitless, but other than that, nothing much has been
happening.”

Anna looked at
Sam. “I’m surprised no one has called, especially the ones who ran screaming
from the house.”

“I don’t know,”
he admitted.

“Sheriff?”

“Yes, Janet,
just stay put and keep doing what you’re doing. We’ll be back soon.”

“Who was it?”
Janet asked. Anna turned her radio off. She simply couldn’t think about
anything other than what had to be done in that instant.

“What do we do
with the bodies?” Matthew asked.

“We put them in
my cruiser,” Anna answered without inflection.

“In the
cruiser?” Geraldine cried. “Is that really the best idea?”

“Do you want to
stay here with them?” Anna shot back.

“Well, no,”
Geraldine said softly.

“Then they go
with us. I’ll be damned if I’m leaving them here.”

“Isn’t that a
violation of protocol?” Sam asked.

“To hell with
protocol,” Anna retorted. “Besides, the coroner won’t be at the morgue to
receive them, will he?”

Sam looked at
David’s body. “Guess not.”

“Okay, then,”
Matthew interrupted. “Let’s do this.”

They loaded the
bodies into the back of Anna’s cruiser, then stood back and looked at the
Explorer as if it were the Wendigo itself.

“Geraldine, I
need you to go back to the station,” Anna ordered. “Make sure Michael is okay,
and fill him in on what happened. Gather the rest of the force and keep them at
the station. We will be there shortly and we’ll figure out how to explain all
this shit.”

“Sounds good,”
Geraldine said as she separated from the group and climbed in her car.

With the Wendigo
and bodies in tow, the others loaded into the Explorer and drove down the
driveway.

“I’ll never look
at that house the same way again,” Trevor said as he looked out the back
window.

The Brickton
Estate seemed to almost be alive with movement and darkness. 

* * * * * *

2

Anna shivered in
the frigid air as she stood in the cemetery, watching for any possible
visitors, human or otherwise. She could hardly feel her feet, having been
treading through water and mud under the Brickton Estate. As her breath whirled
around her in the night, she tried to focus on the growing mounds of dirt
around her.

The cemetery
behind St. Mark’s boasted graves spanning more than two centuries, making for a
surreal experience. As Matthew, Trevor, Simon, and Sam dug fresh graves for the
Wendigo, Anish appeared with a large axe.

“Where the hell
did you get that?” Anna asked, perplexed.

“I brought it
with us,” he answered. He ran his fingers along the edge of the glistening head
of the axe. “Pure silver.”

“Good thinking,”
Anna said. “Tell me the truth, did you anticipate that this was a Wendigo?”

“I thought it
might be, which is why I came prepared with silver. This is the only effective,
way to ensure that the Wendigo does not rise again.”

“From your lips
to God’s ears,” Anna said, then laughed. “Or whatever.”

“Or whatever,”
Anish repeated with a rare grin.

Anna couldn’t
believe she was joking after all that had happened. She looked down at the
Wendigo, imagining what it would be like to chop it into pieces.

“This isn’t
going to be pretty,” she said as she watched Anish lift the axe.

Swish!

The axe glided
through the air, cutting off the Wendigo’s arm. Anish proceeded to cut off the
remaining limbs, then gestured to the holes that were being dug. Anna nodded.

“How are those
holes coming along?” she said to the others.

“Almost done,”
Trevor said, working on a second hole.

A horn sounded
in the distance, causing everyone to stop what they were doing. It was like
they were frozen in a cryptic portrait of gravediggers. When it was clear that
no one was driving up the hill toward the church, they resumed their respective
chores.

Anna looked
cautiously around the cemetery, silently agreeing with what Simon had said
under the house. It did seem anticlimactic. Almost too easy.

After the ordeal
was over, and the dirt was once again covering the now buried limbs, torso, and
head of the ancient creature, Anish performed one last ritual over each of the
shallow graves.

“That should
about cover it,” Anish said, smiling at the irony. Suddenly, he froze and spun
around to face the entrance to the woods at the far end of the cemetery.

“What is it?”
Anna asked, fear filling her body.

“I thought I saw
something,” he said slowly. “And I can feel a presence.”

“I do, too,”
Matthew agreed.

“There!” Sam
shouted. “Behind that huge headstone!” He pointed to a large, cement angel that
crouched over the grave of the Brickton family plot. Everyone strained to see
in the dim moonlight.

“We could use
some of those moonbeams, Anish,” Matthew urged. “Any hope of that happening?”

Before anyone,
including Anish, could say a word, a large shadowy figure emerged from behind
the angel. It was too dark to discern who it could be.

“This is police
business!” Anna shouted as she flashed her light toward whoever was approaching
them. “Stop now, get down on your knees, and put your hands behind your head!”

The shadow put
two hands in the air, as if preparing to back off, then pushed both middle
fingers into the air.

“Don’t move,”
Anish said, pushing Trevor and Simon behind him.

“Who is it?”
Matthew asked Sam.

“How the hell
should I know?” Sam huffed.

After a few
seconds, the figure finally became visible.

“Jesus Christ!”
Anna shouted. “You’re dead!”

“Not quite,”
Alan Brickton retorted with a chuckle. “Although I am sure it seemed that way
to you.”

Everyone stood
in shock as they watched Alan approach.

“Is he a ghost?”
Anna asked Anish, not sure what to think about what was unfolding.