The Haunting at Grays Harbor (The River Book 8) (16 page)

“Can you do that?” Steven asked.

“I can, but what about Christina?” Maynard asked. “She’s the
reason Marie’s vortex was coming apart in the first place. I don’t think she’ll
stop.”

“Could we move her?” Roy asked. “Replace her with one of
these bodies, from out in the backyard?”

“Besides how much I hate digging up bodies,” Maynard said,
“you don’t know what that’d do to the power situation here. For all we know,
Unser had just the right number of bodies out there to make this place work.
You might be robbing Peter to pay Paul, might just make things worse.”

“I think we have to open up to Christina,” Steven said. “She
thinks her father is up to no good, and that’s why she’s ripping the vortex
apart. If she understood that we’re trying to reverse things, that we know all
about what Unser was trying to do, and that we’re fighting against it, we’re on
her
side, we might be able to convince her to maintain the vortex so we
can keep reversing Unser’s work.”

“We’d have to repair the rod,” Roy said.

“Nah, just replace it with a spare,” Maynard said. “I got a
couple in my trailer.”

Bingo
, Steven thought.

The lights went out again, and Steven turned his flashlight
back on. “You know, when we were here before, I saw a ghost that we eliminated
many months ago,” Steven said. “Anita, James’ mother. She caused the most
intense coldness. I can feel it again.”

“Vortex defenses,” Maynard said. “Just like at the abandoned
house. Uses what you’re afraid of against you. Since Roy here is afraid of the
dark, it doesn’t surprise me that we keep losing the light.”

“We’ve been coming here for months since we killed off
Anita,” Steven replied, “and there were no disturbances. If Eximere is a
vortex, and these appearances are vortex defenses, why is it only kicking in
now?”

“That is interesting,” Maynard said. “I don’t know.”

“If we want Eximere to get back on its feet,” Roy said, “we
need to get back to the abandoned house and get that vortex squared away.”

“I’ll do it on the condition that you let me back in here to
study this thing,” Maynard said. “If this really is a super vortex, it’s a once
in a lifetime opportunity.”

“I’m sure we can come to some type of agreement,” Roy said.

They followed Steven out of the library and into the
breezeway, where Roy and Maynard grabbed lights from the table, then they all
made their way out the front door. As they stepped into the front yard, Steven
saw the plants and trees flash, then disappear.

They turned around, and the house gone. The entire space was
an empty cavern, the ground below them dirt and rocks.

“It’s never done that before,” Roy said. “The whole place disappear
like that.”

Steven felt panic, worried about Jason’s grave. “What
happened to all the books and objects inside?”

“Gone with it,” Maynard said.

“Would the graves still be back there?” Steven asked.

Before anyone could answer, the trees returned, and then the
house reappeared.

“Come on,” Maynard said. “We need to go fix that vortex
before it rips this place apart!”

Steven dialed Eliza as they drove back to Grays Harbor. Roy
held the phone with the speaker turned on.

“Maynard has seen Eximere,” Steven said. “And he thinks it’s
a vortex.”

“A vortex?” Eliza asked, her voice rising in surprise. “Like
the one you were working on?”

“Bigger,” Steven replied. “He thinks there are three vortices
surrounding Eximere; the one we were working on was just one of the three. And
he thinks they’re all working together to form one giant vortex, with Eximere
at the center. The bodies in the backyard, Eliza… the bodies, they aren’t buried
there to suppress their abilities, like we thought. They’re there to power the
place, to keep it running.”

“Oh my god!” Eliza said. “Do you believe him?”

“I can’t see why not,” Steven replied. “It’s a theory on his
part, but it all fits. Unser may have hated gifteds, or that might have just
been a story Percival was perpetuating. Who knows. He wasn’t above burying them
alive under that goop. He did it deliberately, not because he hated them. He
just wanted to use them to build this giant vortex.”

“I have never heard of such a thing!” Eliza said. “Have you,
Roy?”

“No, never,” Roy replied. “All this vorghost stuff is new to
me. But Maynard seems quite taken with it.”

“Well that’s not surprising,” Eliza said. “Is he going to fix
the rod?”

“Yes,” Steven said, “but he wants access to Eximere in
return, so he can study the place. We’ve agreed to work something out. At one
point the entire house disappeared, Eliza. All the plants and trees and
everything. It came back, but what if it didn’t?”

“Sounds like you don’t have much of a choice,” Eliza said.
“You’ve got to have that other vortex fixed. And once he does it, if Eximere
becomes stable, that would seem to support his theory. Maybe by studying it, he
can figure out what Unser was really up to.”

“I’m thinking we’ll offer to be there any time he wants to visit
it, but that it has to stay secret, only he can know about it,” Roy said. “I’m
not comfortable giving up keys.”

“Sounds fine to me,” Eliza said. “You OK with all this,
Steven?”

Steven swallowed. “What if he finds out about Jason? He’s
obviously capable of trancing, we saw him do it at Marie’s. What if he finds
him? Learns what happened?”

“At some point you may need to tell him,” Roy said. “But I
wouldn’t offer it up. Only if it comes to it. Even if he does find out, he
won’t be bringing in the cops to find the bodies  — it would destroy his
ability to study the place.”

“So much for leverage,” Eliza said. “Seems like we have to do
it his way.”

“I think we’re only in danger if we cut the guy off,” Roy
said. “Now that he’s seen Eximere, he wants to be there, just like we do. We
hold the keys. If we were to deny him access, then he might cause a stir. If we
work with him, I think it can be mutually beneficial.”

Steven sighed.
I should have buried Jason somewhere else,
he thought.
I can still move him, if I have to.
The thought of digging
Jason up and moving his body made him feel sick to his stomach. He’d barely
been able to transport Jason’s body down to Eximere in the first place, he and
Roy holding the edges of a blanket containing his son’s body, carefully
carrying it down the long stairwells. The idea of disturbing him and hauling
him back up those stairs was almost inconceivable.

“I’m OK with that approach,” Eliza said. “What do you think,
Steven?”

“I’m… ” he started, hesitantly. “I’m OK too. It’s just, up
until now, Eximere felt like family. It was just us. With this guy in the mix,
that’ll change.”

“It might,” Roy said. “It probably will.”

“Can you think of any alternatives?” Eliza asked.

“I can’t,” Steven said. “If we want to keep it at all, we
have to open it up to Maynard. The cat’s already out of the bag at this point.”

“Alright,” Eliza said. “Keep me informed, when you can. Good
luck, you two. Please be careful.”

“We will,” Roy replied. “Bye.”

Steven followed Maynard back to the abandoned house. Once
they’d parked in the driveway, Maynard returned to his trailer, this time
removing a metal tool chest from one of the drawers. He took it deep into the
trailer, placing it on the workbench.

“You fellers might get a kick out of this,” he said as he
opened the tool chest, removing the lift-out tray and exposing the open area
underneath. Inside were three sticks that looked like small tree branches,
almost twigs, about fourteen inches in length. The container was lined with a
grey substance an inch thick on all edges, and as Maynard placed the lift-out tray
down, Steven saw that the grey substance was under the tray, too. The twigs
were floating inside the container, remaining equidistant from the sides and
from each other. Maynard reached in and removed one of the twigs, and the other
two readjusted within the compartment.

Maynard held the twig up for Steven and Roy to see. “Made
from a tree that only grows in the River,” he said. “Very hard to grow, and
very hard to transport from the River to here.”

“They react to each other?” Steven asked.

“Kind of like magnets, repelling each other,” Maynard said.
“I have to keep them in this chest, lined with this stuff, so that they aren’t
detected by treasure hunters. They’re very expensive. I’m known as someone who
sells them on occasion, so I have to take precautions.”

Maynard placed the twig in his backpack and handed one of his
old flashlights to Roy. Steven reached inside his jacket to make sure the
flashlight he’d brought from Eximere was still there. Then Maynard passed the
gallon bucket to Roy, who took it.

“Alright,” Maynard said, replacing the tray and locking the
tool chest back up. “We go in there and talk to Christina. If she sees things
our way, it would be nice if she’d give up the original location of the rod
that went travelling. Balance between the rods is important.”

“What about the rod at Barbara’s?” Steven asked. “It’s still
running. A little fucked up, but running.”

“As soon as we put this new one in place,” Maynard said, walking
to the house, “we’ll go right over to her place and decommission that one. We
can’t do it vice versa without making the vortex even more unstable. The new
one goes in first, where it belongs, and then we take out the broken one.”

“Alright,” Steven said, following Maynard as they opened the
door and walked inside. The darkness of the first floor seeped into him, and he
shuddered at the thought of the horrors upstairs. Steven started down the
hallway toward the kitchen, shining his light ahead of him, everything looking
dull and in shades of grey. He was met with a cold blast of air, and he paused,
feeling his skin crawl. He looked down the hallway and saw a thin, starkly
white woman walking out of the kitchen and into the hallway in front of him.
She was tall, with long, straight hair that hung down below her shoulders. She
was staring at him.

“Guys,” Steven said, backing up into Roy. “Change of plans. Is
this Marie?”

“Appears more functional today,” Maynard replied.

The woman continued walking down the hallway toward them, her
eyes focused on the group, widening. “You have something,” she said as she
walked, not dropping her gaze. “You’re carrying something. What?”

“A new rod,” Maynard said. “We’re going to fix the one your
daughter ruined.”

“You know about her?” she asked, walking right up to them and
stopping a couple of feet in front of Steven. “You’ve seen her?”

“It’s all for the best,” Maynard said. “All part of James’
plan. This vortex must be maintained.”

Quick thinking,
Steven thought, appreciating how Maynard was playing things.
He’s almost as good as my dad.

Her face softened and her mouth pouted a little. “James sent
you?” she asked.

Steven was amazed at how crisp and clear she appeared - as
though she really was standing right in front of them.
She detected the rod
and knew she should appear to us,
Steven thought.
And we’re not even in
the River!

Steven dropped into the flow and was horrified to see her
transform into a floating half body, her hair rising wildly above her head, her
upper torso hanging midair, and the rest missing, trailing white tendrils, just
as she had appeared up in the attic. He dropped out of the River, preferring to
converse with her as the tall, commanding woman with long, black hair.

“Did he send you?” she asked. “Is he upset with me? I tried
to stop her, but she’s willful, difficult to control.”

“He wants the vortex repaired,” Maynard replied. “So that’s
what we’re going to do. Where was the rod that was moved? Originally?”

She raised her arm and pointed into the living room. “Behind
the wall, in there. I’ll show you.”

She drifted into the living room, moving to a far wall where
the plaster had fallen, exposing the boards inside. “Here,” she said, pointing
at a hole in the wall.

“I want you to coil this rod,” Maynard said, removing his
backpack and opening it up. He reached in, removed a pair of gloves which he
slipped on, and then pulled the twig out, holding it in front of the woman.
“Then we can fix things.”

She looked down at the twig, and back up at the others. She
seemed distraught.

“Come on, now,” Maynard said. “James wants the vortex
repaired immediately.”

“Will he come see me?” she asked, her voice revealing the
years of waiting she’d endured. “He promised me.”

“If we don’t get this vortex fixed, he’ll be angry,” Maynard
said. “I’ll have to tell him you slowed us down.”

She reached for her hair, and Steven saw her isolate a
strand, which she plucked from her head. “I only want to see him again,” she
said. “He told me he would come back.” She plucked a second strand, and then a
third, twisting them together between her fingers, rolling them into one thick
strand. Then she took the end of it and wrapped it around the end of the twig,
and began to spiral the rest of it down the length of the rod.

Steven watched as the hair came into contact with the twig, and
at that exact spot, the hair transformed into copper wire, and the twig
underneath expanded and became blue. As she wound the hair further down the
twig, the rod continued to change, looking more and more like the one he’d seen
in Barbara’s attic, but without the damage.

“He promised,” she said, slowly continuing to wind the hair.
“I know he’s in the dark, but it’s been a long time. I’ve been here for many
years. He said he’d come back to me, and take me with him.”

“He will,” Maynard encouraged her. “But you’ve got to finish
this first. Keep going.”

Marie continued to wrap the hair, slowly working her way to
the other end of the twig, and completing the rod’s transformation. It hung in
the air, suspended above Maynard’s gloves. Once she’d finished, Maynard
carefully placed the rod into the hole in the wall, and pushed it up behind the
boards to conceal it.

“There,” Maynard said, stepping back.

“You’ll tell him I helped you?” she asked. “And that I love
him, and that I wish that he’d come and take me from here?”

“I will,” Maynard said. “Please return to your vortex now,
and work on keeping it running smoothly until we can decommission the rod that
was lost. I’m sure James would appreciate it if you’d take better care of your
rods in the future.”

“I will,” she said. “Please tell him I will.” She nodded at
them all, then slowly rose from the floor until she had passed through the
ceiling above.

“At least we don’t have to go back upstairs,” Steven said.

“I suggest we stop by Christina’s grave downstairs before we
head over to Barbara’s,” Maynard said. “Explain things to her. We don’t want
her wrecking our work here before we can finish it up.”

They walked to the kitchen and down the wooden steps. The
basement seemed less daunting to Steven this time; brighter, easier to
maneuver.
Probably because I have my own flashlight,
he thought. They
walked to the small back room and opened the door. The plywood was lying on the
ground, as though it had never been disturbed. Roy lifted it, resting it
against a wall, and Steven felt a chill as he once again saw Christina’s pale,
dirty fingers emerging from the grave.

“Alright,” Maynard said, sitting down. “I’ll trance again.
Join me when it’s ready to go. Either of you see the trowel?”

They glanced around the room, looking for the small hand
shovel that had been in the bucket. It was nowhere to be seen.

Maynard sat on the ground next to the grave. “Never mind,” he
said, “I’ll just use my hands.” He took several handfuls of the dirt and spread
it liberally on the top, pressing it into the spongy surface. Then he began the
trance. As Steven waited, he couldn’t help but look at the small fingers in the
ground, motionless. He imagined for a moment what it would be like to be buried
alive, and he felt a wave of claustrophobia wash over him.
Not just buried
alive, buried in this goop,
he thought. He dropped into the River, watching
as Maynard’s trance slowly formed and he opened it to them. When they entered,
Steven expected Christina to be sitting on the grave as before, but this time
she didn’t appear.