Darkness in Appalachia

David entered the station to see several officers gathered around the dispatcher’s desk, nearly blocking the door. It looked like everyone on the current shift and a few from the previous shift were hanging out to talk about something important. He squeezed past them, catching bits and pieces of excited conversation but not really paying attention. The last time he had seen everyone so excited it was because a local churches Halloween party had gotten a little too wild. Or what they considered wild around here.

At his desk, he sat down and checked his work email to see if there was anything that he needed to follow up from previous shifts. Most of the time, there was little in there that pertained to actual work since they didn’t really do much around here. A couple of drunks, some domestic disputes that ended with the victim not wanting to press charges, a car that went into a ditch and busted someone’s farm fence letting out some cattle to wander the roads, and some drug related charges. Most of it would be handled by the officers on duty and he wouldn’t need to do anything except maybe escort a prisoner to the courthouse on his court date. There was nothing in his email except for a notice for a local church’s bake sale and a birthday notification for one of the night duty officers.

He quickly erased the emails and stood, preparing to go out and check his cruiser. The night duty officer that drove it would sometimes forget to clean it out and he couldn’t stand sitting in a car with old coffee and fast food wrappers while he drove. He was stopped before leaving the desk by one of the night officers coming over to his desk.

He was a young kid, couldn’t even grow a full beard yet even though he tried so hard to do so. He had scrawny arms and legs with a slight beer belly already beginning to develop and straw colored hair. Overall, he looked like a walking talking scarecrow.

“Did you hear about what the state boys said?”

“No. Was it about the little girl we found?” His interest was piqued and he sat back down.

“Yeah. Turns out that she’s not the only body that’s been found like that. There’s two other cases in the last month with three bodies. The good news is that they think they know who the girl is. One of the cases was a couple that was camping in the woods and the locals believed that they had their daughter with them even though she wasn’t found. Said that they found a couple of toys and clothes that could have belonged to our girl. It didn’t show up on a local search because it happened in West Virginia nearly a month ago.”

“So something killed her parents and took the child? Keeping her for a full month before killing her here? What the fuck, man?” David felt his stomach turn as he imagined what that child had been through.

“Tell me about it. This goes beyond state, man. Federal boys are coming in since it involves a kidnapping across state lines and multiple bodies. They are supposed to be here later today and I bet they are going to want to see where we found the body. The other three were found in extremely out of the way places just like the little girl.”

David felt a little uneasy at the thought of federal boys on Robyn’s property. If he had noticed something suspicious about her it was almost definite that they would as well. He should probably call and warn her as soon as he could. “What about the other body? Where did they find it?”

“Just over the state line about a week after the couple. He was a hunter. He was out with some buddies and split off to chase down a deer. They went after him when he didn’t come back in a reasonable amount of time and found him like that. Locals were pissed because they carried him out of there instead of calling them. They claimed that they had marked the scene but they couldn’t lead the police to it later.”

David shook his head. Civilians messed up more scenes than everything but weather, in his opinion. “That sucks. It would have been the freshest scene so there might have more trace than any of the other. How was the couple found?”

“This is the worst. Another couple was supposed to meet up with them after a couple of days. They brought their five year old out there and he was the one who found the first body. Ran ahead of his parents when they got close to the site. Kids going to be in therapy for years after something like that.”

“Hell, the parents will probably be in therapy, too. Jesus, that sucks.” He couldn’t even imagine walking up with your child to find close friends torn open like that. He hadn’t known the child and couldn’t manage to get the image out of his head and it had to be worse with someone you knew.

“They’d been going with the idea that it was an animal attack and that the girl had run off and gotten lost in the woods. They organized searches for nearly two weeks before giving up. Now, they know it wasn’t an animal attack since there are three cases and the wounds are almost exactly the same for all four bodies. And, there’s no way they girl came all the way down here by herself.”

David leaned back in the chair and closed his eyes. With all this new information, he knew that things had just become much more difficult for him and Robyn. They knew that this wasn’t something the locals or the feds could do anything about and now they would have to work around them with more intense scrutiny. He definitely needed to get in touch with her and see how she wanted to play things. Maybe he could arrange it so that he escorted the feds out to the site and kept an eye on them to keep them away from anything they didn’t need to see.

He stood, surprising the kid who had perched himself on the edge of his desk. “This doesn’t have much to do with us. The feds will take over once they get here and probably won’t tell us anymore than they have to. It’s best to just go about our business and maybe they will get out of here quickly before rumors start to fly.”

The kid stood, “Too late for that. You know how it is around here. Someone farts in church and everyone knows about it before the wind has passed his ass cheeks.”

That surprised a laugh out of David, even more so because it was true. When you work in a small town, everyone knows everything almost before it happens. There are no secrets and, sometimes, the cops themselves are the worst gossips. There would be a group hanging around the station for a good part of the day ready to pass along any news of the feds when they showed up. By the time school let out, everyone in town would know what they looked like, what they drove, what they wore, whether they smoked, whether they wore wedding rings or not, and probably a whole lot more. It just made him wonder how Robyn and her family had managed to keep their secret for so long.

He started outside, planning on cleaning out the car and getting away from the station. He would park somewhere that he would watch the traffic and call Robyn on his cell. Hopefully, she had a plan in place to deal with nosier than usual people.

Robyn was sitting at her kitchen table clutching a cup of coffee for dear life. She had stayed up until nearly 4 am trying to find the spells she needed and was now planning a busy day on only two hours of sleep. She heard her phone ring but was too tired to get up and get it off the counter. She decided that she would check it later, after she had had a few more cups of coffee.

“Hello.” Puk’s voice caused Robyn to jerk her head up. “Hey, David. Robyn is here but she is looking kind of rough. Is there something that I can help you with? You know that I’m up for anything.” She listened for a minute before walking over to Robyn who was glaring at her. “He said that he needs to talk to you. It’s important.”

She snatched the phone from Puk’s hand as she sat down across from her, trying to steal her coffee cup. “Hey, David. What do you need?”

His voice was a little scratchy over the phone. “Just wanted to give you a heads up. There were more bodies found like the one on your property and the feds have been called in. They will probably want to come out to your place sometime today and see where we found the body.”

She sat up straighter, shaking off the cobwebs to make sure that she got everything that she needed. “Where and when were the other bodies found?” She sensed his hesitation and knew that he was reluctant to share details about an active case. She waited to see what he would do, not willing to push him into doing something that made him uncomfortable but really hoping he would tell her just a little.

“Three more bodies. Two found in West Virginia and one found just across state lines over the last month.”

She bit her lip and tried to think if the little bit of information he gave meant anything to her. “Crossing state lines explains why the feds have been called in. And I take it that the bodies were found in similar enough condition to link the cases and to leave animal predation out of the equation?” She spoke absentmindedly, baring realizing that she was speaking out loud.

“That’s right. But what I’m most worried about is the feds coming out to your place. You can bet that if I found something off about you that they will too. And are you sure that there is nothing at the site that would lead back to you or be too hard to explain.”

“That’s not something that you need to worry about. They won’t find anything that suggests I was out there and there won’t be anything to lead them to any suspects. Unless, you are asking me to put something there to point them in another direction.”

“No, don’t even think about it. I was just worried that they would see something weird out there and become interested in you and what you are doing.”

“The barrier will prevent them from seeing anything except woods. I told you that it prevents outside entities from entering but it also prevents humans from seeing anything outside of the norm. Unless they already know quite a bit about magic, the barrier should work just fine.”

“Oh, well that should be OK then. Are you going to be around if they want to talk to you?”

“Why would they want to talk to me? It doesn’t matter. I won’t be at home today and it doesn’t do any good to have my cell phone out in the mountains so I will be unreachable for all extents and purposes.”

“That’s probably a good thing. I will try to steer them away from you, as well.”

She smiled. “Thanks. I don’t think it’s necessary but I do appreciate it. It will leave me more time to take care of things around here.”

“And I will also be out there tonight. I hope you will be home around dinnertime so that we can talk about what you’ve found out and how I can help.” His voice softened and became husky. “And maybe you would be willing to dance with me again. I didn’t really get to show you all my moves last night.”

Puk became way too interested in Robyn’s blushing face so she turned away from her. “I don’t think that’s a good idea. With the feds in town, it wouldn’t be a good idea to do anything that might make you look suspect.” That wasn’t the real reason but at least it sounded believable. “Besides, it’s a long drive to get here and you would just have to turn around and head back after dinner to get ready for work tomorrow.”

She could hear the smile in his voice. “I think that I can handle it. And the feds probably won’t stay here overnight. They will probably realize that there isn’t much here besides the body to help with their case and head out someplace else.” He ended the call before she could object again. “I’ve got to get off the phone. Send me a text if there’s anything you want me to pick up for dinner.”

She felt a mixture of pleasure and frustration at the thought of him coming over. She did want to see him again but she really needed to focus on what was happening and on what she needed to do. He could end up being more of a distraction than she needed and someone could get hurt because of it. She turned back towards the table to find that Puk had stolen her coffee.

“You look like shit, girl.” Puk didn’t drink the coffee, simply sat holding it in both hands close to her face. “I hope that you found something worth those bags under your eyes.”

Robyn placed her elbows on the table and rubbed her temples. “Maybe. I got a message from another guardian about an entity that could be what we are dealing with but there’s no way to really know. I spent most of last night looking up different types of magic. I needed some spells that I don’t normally use.”

Puk slid the coffee back across the table. “Why don’t you tell me about it while I fix you breakfast? Or, if you want to wait for Walker, you can tell me more about what happened between you and David last night.”

Robyn groaned. “Didn’t you see enough last night? You already know what happened.”

Puk spoke between banging pots and pans on the stove. “I saw what happened and I know that he likes you. I’m pretty sure that you like him, too. What I don’t know is what you are going to do about it.”

“I’m not going to DO anything about it. I have known him for two days and I still say that I don’t want a partner. Maybe, and I mean maybe, I would be willing to consider seeing him in town or at his place because I am attracted to him but I don’t want him here. And I’m sure that when things settle down, he won’t be coming around here as much anyways.”

There was a long silence and Robyn wondered if maybe she had been a little too harsh. When Puk finally spoke, her voice was soft and almost too quiet to hear. “Is is really that bad being a guardian?”

Robyn turned in her seat to face Puk to find her with her head bowed over the pan she was cooking eggs in. “You know that’s not the problem, Puk. I love being a guardian but it does mean that I have to give a lot of things up. I was lucky in that my parents sent me to boarding school and allowed me to travel during breaks so I got to see a lot of the world. But when I became guardian, I had to give up on getting my degree and I lost a lot of the friends that I made since I can’t travel and I can’t invite people here. There’s also the idea that if I have children, my firstborn won’t have a choice. They will never be able to leave, never travel, and never know anything beyond what they can see within two days of here. I don’t want to be responsible for doing that to someone without them having a choice.”

Puk turned. “So don’t have kids. Last thing I want is more rugrats around here. You and your siblings were bad enough and I am getting way too old to deal with children. But David can make the choice for himself and he is willing to take the risk even after you explained it to him. He’s a grown man and can completely understand what he would be giving up is he became bound.” She came towards Robyn and laid a skeletal hand on her shoulder. “I just don’t want you to be alone anymore. And what are you going to do when Walker and my time is up? As far as I can tell, we are the only friends that you have and we are already very old. We can’t live forever.”

“I do understand that and I know it’s going to be hard. But do you really believe that after two days David understands what this is all about? What about his family? Do you know where they live? It sounded like he was pretty close to them, what happens when he can’t go visit them? And we know that he’s not from around here so what if he wants to visit friends from back home? Or travel. We don’t know whether he wants to travel or not. Maybe, he takes a vacation every year and goes to a different country for a week.” She took Puk’s hand. “I’m not saying that I am not going to see him again, I just want to do it away from here until he knows for sure that this is something he can deal with. I don’t want him to be trapped.”

Puk looked at her suspiciously. “Sooooo, that means that you are willing to give him a chance? Maybe at least get laid once or twice?”

Robyn sighed. “He’s not going to back off when he can tell that I am attracted to him and you would hound me endlessly if I didn’t.” Besides, she really liked kissing him though she didn’t tell Puk that.

Puk turned back to the stove and began filling plates. “I guess that will have to do. But I still want details.”

From the doorway, Walker’s rough voice cut in. “Now that that bullshit is out of the way, can we actually talk about something important?” He stalked in, glaring in Puk’s direction before going to his seat at the table. “I can’t believe with what’s going on that this is what you two are worried about.”

Robyn picked her coffee cup up and held it in front of her face to hide a smile. “Don’t blame me. Puk started on me first thing and I’m too tired to argue with her.”

He grumbled. “That makes since. That pukwudgie is completely shameless around men and can only dream about having one of her own. Can’t get her head out of the gutter even when there are much more important things to discuss.”

Puk dropped his plate in front of him and slammed his large coffee cup of water down, sloshing water and food onto the table. “I guess you have something to discuss that would be more pertinent. I thought that you were concerned about Robyn being left alone, too. Didn’t you tell me that you liked David and hoped that Robyn would at least consider him?”

He growled and showed his teeth. “I did say that but it’s Robyn’s choice. This isn’t like choosing a mate for your bitch dog that you want to breed. Besides, we have an entity that was on the property recently that could be really dangerous. That should be the focus right now. Leave the romance for when we know we aren’t in danger.”

Puk sat down after giving Robyn her plate. “And when would that be? There’s always a risk of danger for a guardian. Just because we know that it’s a little more imminent this time doesn’t really change things that much.”

Robyn interrupted before they could really start fighting. “Enough. Both of you have good points. Walker, we decided to talk about David since we wanted to discuss the situation when all of us were together and we knew that my love life would make you uncomfortable. Puk, now that Walker is here, let’s drop the talk about David.” They continued to glare at each other for another minutes before turning their attention to their food. “Good, now after breakfast, I need to know if you found anything when you checked the boundary yesterday. I can also fill you two in on what David told me this morning and let you know what I found out last night from another guardian.”

Both nodded their heads and dug into breakfast. Random chit chat filled the room between bites of food and the sounds of silverware clinking on plates. The rule of not discussing work during meals had been strongly enforced ever since Robyn was a child and she just couldn’t seem to break that tradition even though she really wanted to sometimes. Today, was not one of those days though. Every bite of food helped her to wake up a bit more and she refilled her coffee cup twice during the meal to give herself that little extra pep.

Puk took the plates and Robyn began relaying what David had told her and what she had found out on the computer last night. They both had a lot of questions but there just weren’t any answers. She also told them that she had been looking at offensive magic last night, which wasn’t the entire truth but enough of it that they wouldn’t notice. She rarely had a reason to attack and wanted to make sure that she knew spells that were strong enough to fight if she had to.

“That makes sense. You’ve always focused on defensive and barrier magic. If this thing is as nasty as it sounds, you might need to be able to fight. Is there anything specific that you were leaning more towards?” Walker had always been more offensive than either her or Puk so he was willing to give advice if needed.

Robyn shrugged. “Not really. I don’t know what kind of magic he can use. Does absorbing human souls enable him to use all types of magic or is he still limited by his nature? I just don’t have enough information so I’ve just been looking at things that will do the most damage quickly.”

Walker nodded assent. “That makes sense but you will need to make sure that you familiarize yourself with those spells. And make sure that you always have the materials readily available to complete any of them at any time. We don’t know if this thing is still here or when he will attack.”

Robyn took a sip of her coffee. “Actually, one of my ancestors wrote that we don’t actually need the herbs or runes to complete magic. That they are just used to help focus and maintain a spell. She says that the magic can be performed as long as the person in question is able to keep focused on what they are trying to do. I think that that’s what I should focus on. I can’t guarantee to always have the materials on me or to even be able to carry enough to have an extended battle if it comes to that.”

Puk chimed in. “It’s true that it’s possible and most entities don’t use any materials to do their magic but I have never heard of a human that didn’t. The spells would have to be extremely familiar to the human. So much that they become second nature and you don’t have any like that.”

“I know. That’s why I want to spend a good part of today practicing the strongest spells I can find. If I can get those down by lunchtime, then I can spend the afternoon checking any areas of the boundary that Walker finds suspect and reinforcing them.”

“What should I do today?” Puk leaned back in her chair and crossed her arms.

Robyn turned to her. “I was really hoping that you would fortify the defenses around the house. And contract some of the other entities to find a safe place to meet. I want to have a safe location that I can send weaker entities to. But, you will also need to keep a lookout for the feds if they show up. David will try to be with them but there’s no guarantee and they can’t suspect anything if they come.”

“So defenses and illusion magic. I can do that.”

She turned back to Walker. “I want you to do something as well. We don’t know how many humans or entities this thing has absorbed which means that we have no idea of what kind of power we’re dealing with. Could you speak to the weaker entities and warn them in case they are targets? Let them know about the house and yard. And, also, ask the stronger entities if they would be willing to lend their strength to me if I need it. I’m hoping that it’s not necessary but it would be a good idea to have something in place. If they are willing, I will come around tomorrow and create a lifeline between me and them. That means that their power will only be used if my own isn’t strong enough.”

Walker grunted. “I’m sure that there are several who would agree to help and you can definitely count on me to be one of them. I will visit as many as I can before lunch and then you and I will visit the boundary together.” Robyn started to object but he cut her off. “I know that you were going to tell me to just give you the location of the weaknesses but I’m not going to do that. You have to realize that you could be targeted by this entity just as easily as any of us. You need some form of protection and some way to get help quickly if a situation arises. The dogs can hear my calls from a long distance away and will be able to get help if you or I are immobilized. Puk can speak with the dogs and so can several other entities that will be able to spread the word to those that can’t.”

“I’m with him and I think that it’s non negotiable. It would be just like you Robyn to make yourself the easiest target to get through so that he has to go through you before getting any of us.”

Robyn wouldn’t admit that she had actually been thinking exactly that. “Fine. I won’t argue but we need to go ahead and get started. Walker, I will be at the barn between twelve and one.”

Walker took off out the door and Puk went deeper into the house. Robyn went to the far left cabinet and opened it. She kept herbs for spells here. Her plan was to get the herbs needed to perform the spells and use them to familiarize herself with them. She divided the herbs by what spell they were to be used with and placed them in separate bags before heading outside to the shed. Once on the 4x4, she headed out to a location not too far from the house that didn’t currently have any entities that liked to stay there.

This location had been cleared years ago by her parents and was going to be a location for another small house. They had thought it would be good if Maria could have her own space and didn’t have to stay with them. It would also work as a guest house when she or Edward came home to visit. But it had never been built. The contractors that they hired kept getting scared and quitting, saying that they could feel something watching them from the surrounding woods.

Robyn had turned the area into a training ground, creating a barrier around the clearing that prevented sounds and magic from escaping and disturbing any entities that might be in the area. It also would return the area to its original form once she left the barrier. Nothing done here was permanent. Puk and Walker had helped her set up targets and had helped with her training initially, acting as her adversaries when she was learning offensive and defensive spells.

She planned to do her training here today. She would start out with an easy but powerful earth spell and move onto the harder ones after she’d became familiar with it. She would work on each spell long enough that she could at least cut down on the herbs required to perform it and had the spell memorized so she didn’t need to read it from a page. Hopefully, she could get through most of them before lunch. She had a feeling that something was going to happen soon and wanted to be as prepared as possible before it did.

She sat down and prepared her herbs, starting with the full amount required for the spell and gradually stepping it down until none was used. By laying it out beforehand, she would have one less thing to worry about when she began practicing. She wasn’t familiar with earth magic so this was going to hurt and she didn’t want to take the time between casting the spell to prepare the herbs. That was a good way to make a mistake or talk herself out of continuing. Once that was done, she stood and centered herself, clearing her mind and focusing entirely on what she needed to do here.

She began, taking her time at first and only picking up small hand sized pieces of the dirt before trying to throw them at the target. There was a lot of pain in her feet and legs but not as much as she had expected. After an hour and a half, she had memorized the words and runes needed and could pick up human sized chunks and hit a target 20 feet away. The pain in her legs and feet had retreated to a dull ache but she was beginning to feel the drain on her magical energy and knew it was time to start on the next spell.

She stepped outside of the barrier so that it would return to its previous state and to take a quick breather. Going to the 4x4 sitting down on it while drinking a bottle of water, she thought about the other spells she had planned to learn. They were harder than this one and would take a lot out of her to learn. Maybe it would be better to just pick one or two more and focus on those. If they were strong enough, she might not need the other spells. She could always come back tomorrow and the day after to learn the others. That way, if something happened today, she would have strong spells to try and fight with and, if nothing happened, she would have time to work on spells that weren’t as strong but were more precise.

Having made a decision, she stood and walked back into the barrier. She didn’t have much more time before she had to meet Walker and wanted to get at least one more spell learned before meeting him.