Where Darkness Dwells (47 page)

Mom is so proud of me!

But as he walked--in the back of his mind awaiting the explosion--the air became cooler, downright cold. He soon entered a small chamber with a single candle burning low; though dim, the stark contrast to the previous impenetrable darkness stung his eyes. He blinked away the pain as his vision expanded to fill the room.

A hole covered most of the small room's floor, and from this hole, a bitter updraft gusted.

The panting, frigid breath of the devil, he thought, not sure where the notion originated, one of his ancestors obviously, but that wasn't important. He peered into the open maw, the wind frosting the sweat on his brow.

He first felt the blast through his feet.

Then a rock hit his shoulder, sending him to the ground. The earth quaked as if trying to purge itself of a violent sickness. Rocks tumbled all around him. The ones that fell into the open pit never made a sound.

He sat on his backside, resting his head on his arms propped on his knees. He waited for the explosion to weaken, and when it did, he waited in expectation of the coming flood.

Will it wash me away, down this endless frigid pit? he wondered. The thought didn't scare him. Nothing did anymore.

The water came sooner than he expected. He stood to face the curling waves, their constant collapse and rebirth.

The wave drained into the pit, inches from his feet.

Bodies bobbed in the water, mere debris taken into the plummeting maw. While he didn't care to save his own life, seeing his neighbors' bodies thrown about made him want to scream. He leaned into the flowing wave and timed a reckless swipe for one of the bodies, snagging it by the collar. Though a slim woman, her sodden clothes and momentum nearly sent him over. He yanked hard, and the body fell into his lap. The water continued to rush by, falling into the pit. Arlen was exhausted. He couldn't summon the strength to make another saving effort.

Warmth flowed through the woman's abraded cheek. Not only was she was alive, but she had a caring, pure soul. He could see his grandmother's visions of this woman's future. She would accomplish great things, would be the bedrock for her family's coming generations.

When the flow eased, and he had room to maneuver from the small room, he hefted Jane Fowler onto his shoulder and started for the surface.

20.

Jacob coughed. Flood water burned his lungs as his body tried to expel it. The sun was drying his clothes.

How am I alive? he wondered, yet again. Was it a miracle? He thought perhaps it was.

The water had hit him full-on in the back, and had carried him along, higher through twists and dips in the tunnel, then still higher, until the earth vomited him through a grass-veiled crevasse. The water spewed from the opening for a short while, then slowed to a trickle, before stopping completely. The flood had lost its punch.

He was alive.

And so was Ellie.

She sat on a mossy felled log, staring at him with a bemused expression. "I told you to follow me. I knew it'd lead to a way out."

Once the coughing fit subsided, he tested his bruised thigh. The leg took his weight. A gash bled across his nose, and each of his limbs felt blanketed with bruises. But nothing seemed broken. He gave her a half-hearted glare. "What now?"

"I don't know. Jimmy should be coming, right?"

"I don't think so. I think he's never coming out. I don't think anyone else is. Not even…" he couldn't say it, but it felt like a certainty that he would never see his mom again.

Ellie didn't respond right away, but he knew what she was thinking. Her dad was down there too. He was never coming out, either. She turned away to walk down a narrow game trail. He hurried to catch up.

"I'm sorry, Jacob."

"Stop saying that. I don't want you to ever say that again."

"We need dry clothes."

"True."

"We can come back later, maybe bring along some food. We'll see who comes out."

He didn't like the idea, but it was something for them to do, something to keep them busy. Jimmy had told him to tell anyone who would listen about what had happened Underground. But if someone would listen long enough to hear the story and not think him crazy, would they be the trusting sort, the kind of person would didn't know about the evil happenings below their hometown?

No. They wouldn't tell their story to anyone. Not right away. Not right now. His emotions were simply too raw.

"Jacob! Look! Come quick!" Ellie cried out from around the next bend.

He skirted an impenetrable stand of underbrush and saw Ellie cradling his mom in her lap. Ellie looked deceptively like his mom when they found the body of her brother George. Was that only weeks ago?

But one detail was different in this setting. His mother was moving. She appeared to be gulping for air, as if she had just surfaced after a long time underwater. But no, she was simply overcome with emotion. Her chest hitched, her tears fell.

"Mom!" He ran to her, calling her again and again.

He hadn't seen Arlen Polk right away, but he was standing close by. His arms were folded, and he looked apprehensive, but he also wore a smile. He looked different, as if he was the only person in on a joke that he hoped to share with all. Arlen gave Jacob a nod, and Jacob returned it, finding a smile of his own forming.

When his mom saw him, her crying stopped. She struggled to stand, slumping in his arms as they embraced. She finally stepped back and looked at him, "Look at you, in those wet clothes. You're shivering!"

He didn't want to admit that he wasn't shivering from the cold. When the wave crashed into him, he thought his life was over. But it wasn't. Somehow he'd survived the riotous waves and the jutting rocks and other debris without drowning. And so had his mom and Ellie and Arlen Polk. If so many people he cared about could survive the flooded mine, maybe he could still hold on to hope of seeing others. He promised himself he would never give up on the idea of seeing his brother again. No matter how much time went by.

Epilogue

1.

At the very moment Cooper gave into the ceaseless bombardment of water, when he resigned himself to death and possible interminable damnation, a set of strong, calloused hands grabbed him at the armpits and yanked him above the surface of the water. He choked and vomited and choked some more, his eyes blurred and unfocused. The water continued to rage at his side, carrying bobbing victims off like driftwood after a spring storm.

"You'll be fine, now. Better move, though, before that water gets worse."

Cooper felt too weak to stand. He remained on his hands and knees as he looked up at his savior. He recognized the man. At first his heart leapt with joy, as if this sudden meeting hadn't been mere coincidence, but a long-awaited reunion. But these people didn't know him. And he only knew of them from his dreams.

"Come on, Papa. Let's go." The girl's voice was insistent, edged with desperation.

He remembered the surging water and how it carried Jane away from him, too fast for him to ever hope to catch up. "I couldn't save her. She's gone."

"No one's saved in the Underground."

"Papa--"

"But you saved me." He looked from Harold to his daughter, draped in a thin blanket and naked beneath, then back again. "Where's Benjamin?"

"How do you know about him?" Harold Barrow stepped in front of his daughter to shield her from Cooper.

Close by but out of sight, people screamed in pain, wounded mortally but fated to never succumb to their wounds.

"You're Harold. That's your daughter, Edwina. I've dreamed about you. The Blankenships wanted me to help you. Their spirits linger inside their house, unable to move on knowing they couldn't help you. They showed me--their spirits--showed me everything."

Harold looked at him sharply and took up a defensive stance.

"I know this sounds crazy--"

"You know the preacher?"

"I bought their house. My name's Ted Cooper. I've dreamed of your family coming to the Blankenships' house, how you listened for the sound of Eunice's organ and saw the water dipper sign. You gave the secret knock. They took you in and you waited for Benjamin to arrive."

The flowing water rose higher to breech the banks. Cooper stood and for a moment he thought he might black out. Harold grabbed him by the arm to steady him.

Harold leaned in as if for clarification, his posture relaxing. "You really knew them?"

"Papa, I don't trust him." Edwina looked at Cooper with disdain. Since the night of their capture, her hair had been shaved. Her eyes were cold and unwavering.

Cooper felt his eyes well with tears. "I've seen what you've had to endure. I'm so sorry." "Oh, Mr. Cooper, it's not your fault," Harold said.

"I can help you. I know the way to the surface," Cooper said, certain that everything the Blankenships had revealed to him had led to this moment. "Where's Benjamin? We have to get moving."

"That's a long story too long even for this place. We'd be happy though, if you know the way to daylight."

"Papa!"

"Hush, girl. We need all the help we can get. I haven't been this far from the stables in fifty years or more."

"It's this way." Cooper shouted into the old man's ear to be heard over the sound of the raging water.

Edwina was reluctant, her father less so, but they followed as Cooper navigated to higher tunnels, twisting away from their nightmare.

Cooper knew they were close when he came across the stones set at the corners of the low tunnel to mark the distance leading to his home. The Blankenships never intended for the markers to be used to travel back toward their house, but they served a vital and reaffirming role just the same as they came across one after another.

"This is it. Mr. Cooper, we're close, aren't we?"

Cooper pushed aside a few large boulders, exposing the hidden entryway to his basement. He climbed through the opening, helping the Barrow's one after the other.

"I haven't seen this place in so long. But it feels like yesterday." Harold held his daughter's hand as they shared a heartbreaking look.

"Oh, Papa--" The coldness left Edwina's face, and the transformation revealed the true depths of her beauty. She embraced her father, looking at Cooper over Harold's shoulder.

The skin of her cheek had begun to sag, showing blood and pus beneath. When her face creased into a smile, the skin began to separate along those lines.

"It's coming on. Oh, how I've prayed for this moment."

"We better go, Papa."

His embrace lingered several more seconds, then he held his daughter at arms length. "I wish Benjamin were here, Sweets. He was a good man."

Edwina's happiness dimmed for a moment, but she blinked it back to full gleam. Decay flowed from her eyes in the wake of her tears, trailing gray runnels down her face like melted wax.

When Cooper turned to lead the way upstairs, a bitter gust of air slammed into him. In the stagnant basement heat, he nearly staggered, but the sensation quickly passed.

He whispered as he climbed the stairs, the Barrows a step behind, "You said I would help save them, but they saved me. I bet you knew all along, didn't you?"

A fading cold caress brushed his cheek, then was gone. He never felt the Blankenships' presence again. His deed was done. The Blankenships could finally rest.

"Sunlight, sweet Jesus, sunlight!" Harold cried out as they reached the ground floor landing. Cooper's home was in shambles after Ethan and his men tore through it, but no place had ever seemed more inviting. He guided them upstairs and through the hallway leading to the front door. Broken glass littered the floor. Dust billowed in the sunlight streaming through the windows.

"Papa, it’s beautiful!"

Cooper turned to face the Barrows, but they didn't take note of him. Their failing faculties were focused on the warm glorious sunlight--a sight they'd been deprived of for over seventy years. Cooper rushed ahead and opened the front door, stepping aside to let them walk by.

By the time they reached the outside porch, Harold and his daughter could barely move. They were rotting. But their vigilance never flagged. Cooper sat on the edge of the porch and rested. Harold and Edwina walked down the steps, up the drive and around the bend near the street. He thought they wouldn't have lasted much farther, but Cooper never found any evidence that they hadn't made the end of the drive, and just kept walking.