Running With The Demon

CHAPTER 20

John Ross rode out to Sinnissippi Park with the desk clerk from the Lincoln Hotel, who, was having Sunday dinner with his brother and sister–in–law just to the north. The man dropped him at the corner of Third Street and Sixteenth Avenue, and Ross walked the rest of the way. The man would have driven him to the Freemarks' doorstep–offered to do so, in fact–but it was not yet two o'clock and Ross was not expected until three and did not want to arrive too early. So instead he limped up Third to Riverside Cemetery, leaning heavily on his black staff, moving slowly in the heat, and found his way to Caitlin Freemark's grave. The day was still and humid, but it was cool and shady where he walked beneath the hardwood trees. There were people in the cemetery, but no one paid any attention to him. He was wearing fresh jeans, a pale blue collared shirt, and his old walking shoes. He had washed his long hair and tied it back with a clean bandanna. He looked halfway respectable, which was as good as it got.

He stood in front of Caitlin Freemark's grave and looked down at the marble stone, read the inscription several times, studied the rough, dark shadow of the letters and numbers against the bright glassy surface. CAITLIN ANNE FREEMARK, BELOVED DAUGHTER & MOTHER. He felt something tug at him, a sudden urge to recant his lies and abandon his subterfuge, to lay bare to the Freemarks the truth of who he was and what he was doing. He looked off toward their house, not able to see it through the trees, visualizing it instead in his mind. He pictured their faces looking back at him. He could not tell them the truth, of course. Gran knew most of it anyway, he suspected.

She must. And Robert Freemark? Old Bob? Ross shook his head, not wanting to hazard a guess. In any case, Nest was the only one who really mattered, and he could not tell her. Perhaps she did not ever need to know. If he was quick enough, if he found the demon and destroyed it, if he put an end to its plans before it revealed them fully …

He blinked into the heat, and the image of the Freemarks ' faded from his mind.

Forgive me.

He walked on from there into the park, skirting its edges, following the cemetery fence to Sinnissippi Road, then the road past the townhomes to the park entrance and beyond through the big shade trees to the Freemark residence. Old Bob greeted him at the door, ebullient and welcoming. They stood within the entry making small talk until Gran and Nest joined them, then gathered up the picnic supplies from the kitchen. Ross insisted on helping, on at least being allowed to carry the blanket they would sit on. Nest picked up the white wicker basket that contained the food, Old Bob took the cooler with the drinks and condiments, and with Gran leading the way they went out the back door, down the steps past a sleeping Mr. Scratch, across the backyard to the gap in the bushes, and into the park.

The park was filled with cars and people. Picnickers already occupied most of the tables and cooking stations. Blankets were spread under trees and along the bluff, softball games were under way on all the diamonds, and across from the pavilion the Jaycee–sponsored games were being organized. There was a ring toss and a baseball throw. The horseshoe tournament was about to start. Carts dispensing cotton candy and popcorn had been brought in, and the Jaycees were selling pop, iced tea, and lemonade from school–cafeteria folding tables. Balloons filled with helium floated at the ends of long cords. Red, white, and blue bunting hung from the pavilion's rafters and eaves. A band was playing under a striped tent, facing out onto the pavilion's smooth concrete floor. Parents and children crowded forward, anxious to see what was going on.

"Looks like the whole town is here," Old Bob observed with a satisfied grin.

Ross glanced around. It seemed as if all the good places had been taken, but Gran led them forward determinedly, past the diamonds, the pavilion, the games, the cotton candy and popcorn, the band, and even the toboggan slide, past all of it and down the hill toward the bayou, to a grassy knoll tucked back behind a heavy stand of brush and evergreens that was shaded by an aging oak and commanded a clear view of the river. Remarkably, no one else was there, save for a couple of teenagers snuggling on a blanket. Gran ignored them and directed Ross to place the blanket in the center of the knoll. The teens watched tentatively as the Freemarks arranged their picnic, then rose and disappeared. Gran never looked at them. Ross shook his head. Old Bob caught his eye and winked.

The heat was suffocating on the flats, but here it was eased by the cool air off the water and by the shade of the big oak. It was quieter as well, the sounds of the crowd muffled and dis- ' tant. Gran emptied the contents of the picnic basket, arranged the dishes, and invited them to sit. They formed a circle about the food, eating fried chicken, potato salad, Jell-O, raw sticks of carrot and celery, deviled eggs, and chocolate cupcakes off paper plates, and washing it all down with cold lemonade poured from a thermos into paper cups. Ross found himself thinking of his childhood, of the picnics he had enjoyed with his own family. It was a long time ago. He visited the memories quietly while he ate, glancing now and again at the Freemarks.

Should I tell them? What should I tell them? How do I do what is needed to help this girl? How do I keep from failing them?

"Did you enjoy the service, John?" Old Bob asked him suddenly, chewing on a chicken leg.

Ross glanced at Nest, but she did not look at him. "Very much, sir. I appreciate being included."

"You say you're on your way to Seattle, but maybe you could postpone leaving and stay on with us for a few more days." Old Bob looked at Gran. "We have plenty of extra room at the house. You would be welcome."

Gran's face was tight and fixed. "Robert, don't be pushy. Mr. Ross has his own Me. He doesn't need ours."

Ross forced a quick smile. "I can't stay beyond tomorrow or the day after, thanks anyway, Mr. Freemark, Mrs. Freemark. You've done plenty for me as it is."

"Well, hardly." Old Bob cleared his throat, regarded the leg bone in his hand. "Darn good chicken, Evelyn. Your best yet, I think."

They finished the meal, Old Bob talking of Caitlin as a girl now, recalling stories about how she had been, what she had done. Ross listened and nodded appreciatively. He thought it might have been a while since the old man had spoken of his daughter like this. Gran seemed distracted and distant, and Ross did not think she was paying much attention. But Nest was watching raptly, studying her grandfather's face as he related the stories, listening carefully to his every word. Her concentration was so complete that she did not seem aware of anything else. Ross watched her, wondered what she was thinking, wished suddenly that he knew.

I should tell her. I should take the chance. She's stronger than she looks. She is older than her fourteen years. She can accept it.

But he said nothing. Old Bob finished, sighed, glanced out across the bayou as if seeing into the past, then reached over impulsively to pat his wife's hand. "You're awfully quiet, Dark Eyes."

For just an instant all the hardness went out of Evelyn Freemark's face, all the lines and age spots vanished, and she was young again. A smile flickered at the corners of her mouth, and her eyes lifted to find his.

Ross stood up, leaning on his staff for support. "Nest, how about taking a walk with me. My leg stiffens up if I sit for too long. Maybe you can keep me from getting lost."

Nest put down her plate and looked at her grandmother. "Gran, do you want me to help clean up?"

Her grandmother shook her head, said nothing. Nest waited a moment, then rose. "Let's go this way," she said to Ross. She glanced at her grandparents. "We'll be back in a little while."

They climbed the hill at an angle that took them away from the crowds, east toward the park's far end, where the deep woods lay. They walked in silence, Nest pacing herself so that Ross could keep up with her, limping along with the aid of his staff. They worked their way slowly through the shady oaks and hickories, passing families seated on blankets and at tables eating their picnic lunches, following the curve of the slope as it wound back around the rise and away from the river. Soon Gran and Old Bob were out of sight.

When they were safely alone, Ross said to her, "I'm sorry about what happened at church. I know it was scary."

"I have to show you something," she said, ignoring his apology. "I promised Pick."

They walked on for a ways in silence, and then she asked sharply, accusingly, "Are you an angel? You know, in the Biblical sense? Is that what you are?"

He stared over at her, but she wasn't looking at him, she was looking at the ground. "No, I don't think so. I'm just a man."

"But if God is real, there must be angels."

"I suppose so. I don't know."

Her voice was clipped, surly. "Which? Which don't you know? If there are angels or if God is real?"

He slowed and then stopped altogether, forcing her to do the same. He waited until she was looking at him. "What I told you was the truth–about the Fairy Glen, and the Lady, and the voice, and the way I became a Knight of the Word. What are you asking me, Nest?"

Her eyes were hot. "If there really is a God, why would He allow all those feeders in His church? Why would He allow the demon in? Why would He allow Mrs. Browning to die? Why didn't He stop it from happening?"

Ross took a long, slow breath. "Maybe that isn't the way it works. Isn't the church supposed to be open to everyone?"

"Not to demons and feeders! Not to things like that! What are they doing here, anyway? Why aren't they somewhere else?" Her voice was hard–edged and shaking now, and her hands were gesturing wildly. "If you really are a Knight of the Word, why don't you do something about them? Don't you have some kind of power? You must! Can't you use it on them? Why is this so hard?"

Ross looked off into the trees. Tell her. His hands tightened on the staff. "If I destroy the feeders, I reveal myself." He looked back at her. "I let people know what I am. When that happens, I am compromised. Worse, I weaken myself. I don't have unlimited power. I have … only so much. Every time I use it, I leave myself exposed. If the demon finds me like that, he will destroy me. I have to be patient, to wait, to choose my time. Ideally, I will only have to use my power once–when I have the demon before me."

He felt trapped by his words. "Pick must have told you about the feeders. The feeders are only here because of us. They react to us, to us as humans. They feed on our emotions, on our behavior. They grow stronger or weaker depending on how we behave. The Word made them to be a reflection of us. If we behave well, we diminish them. If we behave badly, we strengthen them. Give them too much to feed on and they devour us. But they're not subject to the same laws as we are. They don't have life in the same way we do; they don't have substance. They creep around in the shadows and come out with any release of the dark that's inside us. I can burn them all to ash, but they will just come back again, born out of new emotions, new behavior. Do you understand?"

The girl nodded dubiously. "Are they everywhere, everywhere in the world?"

"Yes."

"But aren't there more in places where things are worse? In places where the people are killing each other, killing their children?"

"Yes."

"Then why aren't you there? What are you doing here, in this little, insignificant Midwestern town? No one is dying here. Nothing is happening here!" Her voice rose. "What is so important about Hopewell?"

Ross did not look away, dared not. "I can't answer that. I go where I'm sent. Right now, I'm tracking the demon. I'm here because of him. I know that something pivotal is going to take place, something that will affect the future, and I have to stop it. I know it seems incredible that anything occurring in a tiny place like Hopewell could have such an impact. But we know how history works. Cataclysms are set in motion by small events in out–of–the–way places. Maybe that's what's happening."

She studied him fixedly. "It has something to do with me, doesn't it?"

Tell her! "It looks that way," he hedged.

She waited a moment, then said,

Ross nodded slowly. "It's possible."

She glared at him, needing more, wanting a better answer. "But how would that change anything about the future? What difference would that make to anyone but us?"

Ross started walking again, forcing her to follow. "I don't know. What was it you were going to show me?"

She caught up to him easily, kept her hot gaze turned on him. "If you're hiding something, I'll find out what it is." Her voice was hard–edged and determined, challenging him to respond. When he failed to do so, she moved ahead of him as if to push the matter aside, dismissive and contemptuous. "This way, over there, in those trees."

They descended a gentle slope to a small stream and an old wooden bridge. They crossed the bridge and started up the other side into the deep woods. It was silent here, empty of people, of sound, of movement. The heat was trapped in the undergrowth, and none of the river's coolness penetrated to

ease the swelter. Insects buzzed annoyingly in their faces, attracted by their sweat.

"Actually, it wasn't a dream," she said suddenly. "About Gran, I mean. It was a vision. An Indian named Two Bears showed it to me. He took me to see the spirits of the Sinnissippi dance in the park last night after you left. He says he is the last of them." She paused. "What do you think?"

A chill passed over John Ross in spite of the heat. O'olish Amaneh. "Was he a big man, a Vietnam vet?"

She looked over at him quickly. "Do you know him?"

"Maybe. There are stories about an Indian shaman, a seer. He uses different names. I've come across people who've met him once or twice, heard about some others." He could not tell her of this, either. He could barely stand to think on it. O'olish Amaneh. "I think maybe he is in service to the Word."

Nest looked away again. "He didn't say so."

"No, he wouldn't. He never does. He just shows up and talks about the future, how it is linked to the past, how everything is tied together; then he disappears again. It's always the same. But I think, from what I've heard, that maybe he is one of us."

They pushed through a tangle of brush that had overgrown the narrow trail, spitting out gnats that flew into their mouths, lowering their heads against the shards of sunlight that penetrated the shadows.

"Tell me something about Wraith," John Ross asked, trying to change the subject.

The girl shrugged. "You saw. I don't know what he is. He's been there ever since I was very little. He protects me from the feeders, but I don't know why. Even Gran and Pick don't seem to know. I don't see him much. He mostly comes out when the feeders threaten me."

She told him about her night forays into the park to rescue the strayed children, and how Wraith would always appear when the feeders tried to stop her. Ross mulled the matter over in his mind. He had never heard of anything like it, and he couldn't be certain from what Nest told him if Wraith was a creature of the Word or the Void. Certainly Wraith's behavior suggested his purpose was good, but Ross knew that where Nest Freemark was concerned things were not as simple as they might seem.

"Where are we going?" Ross asked her as they crested the rise and moved into the shadow of the deep woods.

"Just a little farther," she advised, easing ahead on the narrow path to lead the way.

The ground leveled and the trees closed about, leaving them draped in heavy shadow. The air was fetid and damp with humidity, and insects were everywhere. Ross brushed at them futilely. The trail twisted and wound through thick patches of scrub and brambles. Several times it branched, but Nest did not hesitate in choosing the way. Ross marveled at the ease with which she navigated the tangle, thinking on how much at home she was here, on how much she seemed to belong. She had the confidence of youth, of a young girl who knew well the ground she had already covered, even if she did not begin to realize how much still lay ahead.

They passed from the thicket into a clearing, and there, before them, was a giant oak. The oak towered overhead, clearly the biggest tree in the park, one of the biggest that Ross had ever seen. But the tree was sick, its leaves curling and turning black at the tips, its bark split and ragged and oozing discolored fluid that stained the earth at its roots. Ross stared at the tree for a moment, stunned both by its size and the degree of its decay, then looked questioningly at the girl.

"This is what I wanted you to see," she confirmed.

"What's wrong with it?"

"Exactly the question!" declared Pick, who materialized out of nowhere on Nest Freemark's shoulder. "I thought that you might know."

The sylvan was covered with dust and bits of leaves. He straightened himself on the girl's shoulder, looking decidedly out of sorts.

"Spent all morning foraging about for roots and herbs that might be used to make a medicine, but nothing seems to help. I've tried everything, magic included, and I cannot stop the decay. It spreads all through the tree now, infecting every limb and every root. I'm at my wits' end."

"Pick thinks it's the demon's work," Nest advised pointedly.

Ross looked at the tree anew, still perplexed. "Why would the demon do this?"

"Well, because this tree is the prison of a maentwrog!" Pick declared heatedly. Quickly, he told John Ross the tale of the maentwrog's entrapment, of how it had remained imprisoned all these years, safe beyond the walls of magic and nature that combined to shut it away. "But no more," the sylvan concluded with dire gloom. "At the rate the decay is spreading, it will be free before you know it!"

Ross walked forward and stood silently before the great oak. He knew something of the creatures that served the Void and particularly of those called maentwrogs. There were only a handful, but they were terrible things. Ross had never faced one, but he had been told of what they could do, consumed by their need to destroy, unresponsive to anything but their hunger. None had been loose in the world for centuries. He did not like thinking of what it would mean if one were to get loose now.

In his hand, the black staff pulsed faintly in response to the nearness of the beast, a warning of the danger. He stared upward into the branches of the ancient tree, trying to see something that would help him decide what to do.

"I lack any magic that would help," he said quietly. "I'm not skilled in that way."

"It's the demon's work, isn't it?" Pick demanded heatedly.

Ross nodded. "I expect it is."

The sylvan's narrow face screwed into a knot. "I knew it, I just knew it! That's why none of our efforts have been successful! He's counteracting them!"

Ross looked away. It made sense. The maentwrog would be another distraction, another source of confusion. It was the way the demon liked to work, throwing up smoke and mirrors to mask what he was really about.

Nest was telling Pick about the encounter with the demon in church that morning, and the sylvan was jumping up and down on her shoulder and telling her he'd warned her, he'd told her. Nest looked appalled. They began to argue. Ross glanced over at them, then walked forward alone and stood directly before the tree. The staff was throbbing in his hand, alive with the magic, hot with anticipation for what waited. Not yet. He reached forward with his free hand and touched the damaged bark gently. The tree felt slick and cold beneath his fingers, as if its sickness had come to the surface, coated its rough skin. A maentwrog, he thought grimly. A raver.

Ross studied the ground about him, and everywhere the earth was damp and pitted, revealing long stretches of the tree's exposed roots. No ants or beetles crawled upon its surface. There was no movement anywhere. The tree and its soil had become anathema to living things.

Ross sighed deeply. His inadequacy appalled him. He should be able to do something. He should have magic to employ. But he was a knight, and the magic he had been given to use could only destroy.

He turned back again. Nest and Pick had stopped arguing and were watching him silently. He could read the question in then- eyes. What should they do now? They were waiting, on him to provide them with an answer.

There was only one answer he could give. They would have to find the demon.

Which was, of course, like so many things, much easier said than done.