Usher's Passing

I'VE KILLED MY OWN SON, THE MOUNTAIN KING HAD SAID.



New Tharpe sat in the clinic's waiting room with the old man's cane across his knees. On the other side of the room, Raven was using the pay phone, and Myra Tharpe sat in a corner and hadn't moved for almost an hour.



New stared at his mother. Conflicting emotions raged inside him. She hadn't wanted Nathan to be found. The men who'd gone out searching hadn't really wanted to find him, either. Nathan had been a sacrifice to the Pumpkin Man, like all the other children who'd disappeared over the years. But could the Pumpkin Man send an earthquake to destroy Briartop if he was denied? Was there a way to destroy him, or would he have the run of the mountain forever? His mother was afraid. He could smell her fear, as sour as buttermilk. Stretch, he ordered her mentally, and pictured it in his mind.



She hesitated for a couple of seconds, then stretched like a marionette on a string. When she was through, she sat exactly as before. Her lank hair hung down and obscured half of her face.



New turned his attention to Raven Dunstan. Scratch your head, he commanded.



She glanced at him, but was engrossed in her conversation. Her left hand casually came up and scratched the back of her scalp.



Was there any limit to the magic? he wondered. He thought of the knife rising from the tangle of thorns; of the lamp lifting from the mantel; of the blue wall of stones that had protected him from Greediguts; of his mother, sitting with her hands clasped in the truck on the ride down to Foxton. If this magic had been in him from birth, as the Mountain King seemed to believe, then New thought it might have been unlocked by his rage in the thorn pit. There had never been a reason for him to need the magic before that day - and now he realized that if the Pumpkin Man had not taken Nathan, he might never have been aware of what lay dormant in his mind.



And if what the Mountain King had told him was true, then New was descended from a line of warlocks and witches that stretched back hundreds of years.



The old man, dying now in a room down the corridor, was his grandfather.



The comets had fallen on the Fourth of July, when he was ten years old, the Mountain King had told him and Raven. Lizbeth had been six, and the year was 1919. The comets had shrieked down from the sky, their blasts shaking the cabin. Shocked from sleep, he'd run out to the front porch and seen the surrounding forest on fire. His father was shouting that they had to gather up what they could and flee. A red streak flashed overhead, and when the explosion tore trees from the ground, the boy who would later be called the Mountain King knew the end of the world had come.



His mother put Lizbeth in his arms and told him to get away, then ran back in to help her husband. Holding his sister tightly, the boy ran from the house through the flaming woods as Lizbeth cried in terror. There was a high, piercing wail that grew deafeningly loud. He looked back and saw the figures of his mother and father coming out of the cabin.



And then there was a blinding flash of fire and the cabin exploded, timbers spinning through the air. Something hit him in the face, knocking him on his back as the hot Shockwave swept past. His next memory was of Lizbeth's hair and night clothes on fire, and himself trying to put out the flames with his hands. His hands were covered with blood, and when his sister saw his face, she screamed.



He couldn't remember how they'd gotten to the ruins. It might have been hours or days later that they huddled together in the stone structure that would become their home. His father had brought him up here and told him the story of his family's past, and the boy remembered how quiet it was, how desolate, how no one else would come up here because it was thought to be a haunted place.



Lizbeth was badly burned. Her mind had slipped away, and most of the time she sat crouched in a corner, rocking herself and crying. He was half blind, tormented by pain, fearful of every noise in the woods. But later - and how much later he didn't know - he left Lizbeth and went down the mountain to where their home had stood. Only a pile of rubble remained. He went through the ashes, found a few scraps of clothes that he and Lizbeth could wear, a pair of his father's boots, a few cans of food that had survived - and his father's charred corpse. The only thing recognizable about it was the gold tooth at the front of his father's skull. Clutched in one hand was the crooked walking stick that had been carved from a piece of hickory by his great-great-grandfather. The stick, though badly scorched, had withstood the fire. It had been passed from generation to generation, his father had told him, and contained within it was both his ancestor's rage and the love he'd felt for the girl in the valley. It was an awesome thing that had to be handled carefully, for it held depths of power that were as yet unfathomed.



He worked the stick loose from the corpse's grasp, and returned to the ruins. Soon afterward, his injured eye hardened and rolled out of his head like a gray pebble. His wounds puckered and scarred. He returned one day from gathering firewood to find Lizbeth playing with the stick. Her trance had broken, but the only thing she recalled was the shriek of the falling comets.



As the years passed, blurring and merging with each other, they rarely left the ruins. They grew closer; their love changed from that of a brother and sister, though the Mountain King couldn't say when or how it had happened.



In May of 1931, Lizbeth delivered a baby boy - her only infant that hadn't been born dead or miscarried. She was eighteen, and the Mountain King was twenty-two. In the autumn of that year, Lizbeth was seen with her baby at a creek near the ruins. Before a week was out, the sheriff came up the mountain and found them.



New could imagine how they'd appeared: an emaciated, filthy man and girl in rags, the infant playing on the littered floor. The sheriff had called the county seat to find out what to do, and some people came to take the child to a state home.



The Mountain King had said he almost killed them; he could have, he said. It would have been easy. But deep in his heart, he knew the baby would be better off. The state people tried to coax them down from the mountain, but neither would leave. They took the child away in a brown Ford after promising to bring them food and clothes, but as far as the Mountain King knew, those people never set foot on Briartop again.



But, New wondered, why had his father chosen to settle on the mountain after growing up in the state home? Had the place of his birth been rooted somehow in his subconscious? Had he been drawn back to it because he sensed the same evil that the Mountain King now said held sway over Usherland? New remembered what his mother had told him about his father's nightmares: he saw the end of the world in his mind. Was it some kind of dim ancestral memory of the coven's destruction? He'd never know for sure; but whatever had been calling his father was now beckoning to him, from Usher's Lodge. What lay in wait for him, inside that house? And what would happen to him if he dared face it?



"New," Raven said, breaking the boy's chain of thought. She stood next to his chair, her notepad in hand. "My father verified the old man's story. On the Fourth of July, 1919, Erik Usher fired cannons at Briartop Mountain; the falling shells were what the Mountain King called comets. The fire destroyed a dozen cabins and killed at least seventeen people." She consulted the notes she'd written down. "There was a list of the dead and missing in the July tenth issue of the Democrat. A couple named Ben and Orchid Hartley were killed - but their children, named Elizabeth and Oren, were never found."



"Oren Hartley," New said. "That's his name, isn't it?"



"I think so. There's no way to verify his story of the baby, though, unless we talk to someone at the state orphanage. The sheriffs records may show something - though I doubt it."



"Do you believe him?"



Raven nodded. "Yes, I do. Why would he invent it? I think Oren Hartley is your grandfather. The rest of the story . . . I don't know. I've seen those figures burned into the walls up at the ruins. I've seen what the Mountain King can do. But . . . I still can't make my mind to accept it, New. I've always thought of witches, warlocks, and magic wands as superstitious folklore." She frowned, looking at the stick across the boy's knees. "He said . . . you were like him. What did he mean?"



New took a deep breath, held it for a second, and then let it leak out. He put his hands around the stick and looked across the room at the pay phone.



Raven saw the boy's green eyes brighten vividly. A vein pulsed rhythmically at his right temple. He was immobile, shutting out everything except what he was concentrating upon.



Raven heard something clicking behind her, and she turned toward the sound.



The pay phone's dial was spinning. There was a metallic snap, and a few quarters tumbled out of the coin-return slot, jingling to the floor.



New directed his attention somewhere else. A white ceramic ashtray on a table near the door leaped up and clattered down. Magazines jumped, their pages flapping. A trashcan whirled like a top, balanced on its rim. The chairs in the room started hopping, leapfrogging over each other. The telekinetic display went on for more than a minute before the objects were still again. Then New looked up calmly at Raven.



Her face was ashen. "Oh," she said softly.



"It's been inside me all this time," New told her, "but I never needed it until I fell into the thorns. Maybe it was in Nathan, too. I don't know." His composed expression suddenly cracked, and Raven had a glimpse, of the scared little boy underneath. "I feel like my insides are on fire," he said. "I think . . . I can do anything I want to do. Anything. I could make you dance if I wanted to. I could crack the walls of this place wide open. I'm scared, because . . . I'm not sure I know how to control it. All I have to do . . . is want something to happen. If I want it hard enough, it does."



Her first impulse was to draw away from him, but his expression of appeal held her firmly. "I don't know what to tell you," she said. "I guess . . . you have to do what you feel is right."



"If what the Mountain King says is true, then . . . my ancestor worshiped Satan before he destroyed that coven. There was evil in him, or the Devil wouldn't have called him. How do I know . . . there's not evil down deep in me, too?"



"Why do you think that?"



"Because I like the magic," New confessed. "I like the feelin' it gives me. I can do anything I please. And . . . Lord help me, but I want to answer what's callin' me from the Lodge." He lowered his chin, his fingers caressing the stick's rough wood. "One half of me . . . wants things to be like they were, before I fell in them thorns. The other half is glad it happened. I'm afraid of that part of me, Miz Dunstan." She watched his fingers tighten around the stick. "I don't want to lose . . . who I used to be."



Raven reached out hesitantly, touching his arm. She felt his bones under the shirt. Ordinary bones, she thought, the same as anyone else's. "You won't," she said, but she knew how little she understood of what this boy had been going through. In the short span of a week, his life had changed - as had her own. Her search for the Pumpkin Man had led her into a dark maze of witchcraft, the past, and strange family ties. What lay at the maze's center? she wondered. What was leading her through the blind alleys and twisted corridors between the past and the future?



She knew: Usher's Lodge. She'd known ever since that day she'd spoken to Myra Tharpe in the Broadleaf Cafe, and Myra had mentioned "something dark" that lived alone in the Lodge. At first, Raven had thought that perhaps someone did live in it, as much of a hermit as the Mountain King - someone who came out at night to roam the forests, able to snatch children away without leaving a trace behind. Rix Usher had said the Lodge was kept unlocked; it would be a perfect shelter for a madman who wanted to enact the legends of the Pumpkin Man.



She'd known that somehow she would have to get into that house herself, to search through its darkness for traces of the child-killer she thought might be hiding there. But after listening to New tell her how he felt - and heard - the Lodge calling him, as it had beckoned his father and the Mountain King as well, Raven realized the Lodge might be hiding much more than the Pumpkin Man.



Satan finds the man, the Mountain King had said to New. He's callin' you, like he called your pa and like he called me, all these years . . . He wants the power that's in you . . .



If some insidious force of evil dwelt at Usherland, Raven thought, might it be trying to draw New back to the web his ancestor had escaped?



Dr. Robinson came around the corner into the waiting room. Both New and Raven turned their attention toward him. Myra Tharpe still sat slumped over, all her energy gone, her spirit defeated.



"How is he?" Raven asked.



The doctor shook his head grimly. "He's fading. I'll tell you, though, he's one strong old bird. We've done all we could, but . . . his system's taken a jolt. Did either of you know he's had pneumonia for quite some time? And he's so anemic his blood's as thin as dishwater. By all rights, he should've been bedridden over a year ago." He glanced at New. "I understand that you told the nurse he has no next of kin. No one to notify . . . to arrange things, I mean."



"I'll pay the bill," Raven said. "I told the nurse that."



"That's not what I mean. The old man's dying. I hate to be so blunt, but . . . who's going to make arrangements for the body? Sheriff Kemp?"



"No sir." New rose from his chair. He looked at his mother, who hadn't moved, and then back to Dr. Robinson. "I was wrong, sir. He does have next of kin. He's my grandfather, and I'll take care of him."



"New," Myra rasped, but he paid no heed.



"Oh. I see." It was clear that Dr. Robinson didn't see, though he was seemingly satisfied. "Well . . . in that case, you've got some mighty strong blood in your veins, son. Your grandfather's a fighter."



"Yes sir," New said. "Can I see him?"



"I doubt if he'll know you're there, but go ahead if you like."



"Do you want me to go with you?" Raven asked, but New shook his head and left the waiting room.



When he was gone, Dr. Robinson said quietly to Raven, "The old man's hanging on by his fingernails. I don't know why, but he won't let go."



New stood in the Mountain King's room, listening to his faint breathing. Dim gray light filtered through the blinds at the single window. The lamp over the old man's bed had been turned off. The Mountain King didn't move. New stood where he was for a while longer, then turned to leave.



"Boy," the old man whispered weakly. "Don't . . . go yet."



New moved closer to the bed. "Are you hurtin'?" he asked tentatively.



"No. Not no more. He got me, didn't he?" The Mountain King chuckled hoarsely. "Old sumbitch . . . got me when my back was turned. Few years ago . . . I would've torn the hide right off his bones."



"Miz Dunstan found a story in an old newspaper," New told him. "It was about... the comets that fell. Your name is Oren Hartley."



"Oren . . . Hartley," he repeated. "That sounds . . . like a sissy preacher's name. That ain't me, boy. I'm the Mountain King." He said it with defiant pride. "Did . . . that story have my folks' names, too?"



"Your father's name was Ben. Your mother's was Orchid."



"Oh. Those are . . . right nice names, I reckon. They kinda ring a bell, but . . . it's been so long. Take my hand, boy. Hold it tight."



New grasped it. The Mountain King's hand was cold. "What I did to your pa," he whispered, "I did . . . because I was afraid. He was weakenin'. He . . . didn't know who or what he was . . . and he was about to answer what was callin' him."



"What would have happened to him if he'd gone down to the Lodge?"



"The Lodge," the Mountain King hissed bitterly. "It ain't . . . just a house, boy. It's the Devil's sanctuary. It's . . . a church to worship evil. If your pa had gone there . . . what lives in that house would've snared him. There's . . . a power in the Lodge that calls you, and promises . . . everything in the world to you. But all it wants . . . is to use you. To catch and hold you . . . like them thorns on the mountain." He gave a soft, weary sigh. "You don't much like your life, do you? Sometimes . . . you wish you could live at Usherland, and not have to . . . go back to that cabin. Ain't that right?"



"Yes."



"Where you live ain't important," he said. "It's what . . . lives in you. Them Ushers have got money . . . but they live in a cage, without knowin' it. Once in a while they bump their heads on the bars. All their money can't buy 'em the key. You be . . . proud of who you are, boy. The rest'll take care of itself. And your ma . . . she's just scared for you, 'cause she loves you. Don't begrudge her that."



"She didn't want the men to find Nathan," he replied coldly. "She didn't want Nathan to come home!"



"Yes, she did. If she . . . pretended not to, it was to keep herself goin' on. You're all she's got now. I reckon . . . I had a part in that." He squeezed New's hand. "Do you forgive me, boy? For what I done to your pa?"



"I miss him. I miss him a lot."



"I know that. But . . . it had to be done. Do you see that?"



"Yes," New said.



"At least... he died as the man you knew. Not... as what he would've been, if he'd gone down to the Lodge."



"What happened to Nathan?" There was steel in his voice. "Where did the Pumpkin Man take my brother?"



"I don't know. All I know is . . . the Pumpkin Man is part of it. Part of what's callin' you from Usherland. I don't know what the Pumpkin Man is, or why he takes those young'uns."



"And what would happen to me," New asked, "if I went down to the Lodge?"



The old man was silent. In the distance, New heard the throaty rumble of thunder. "Then . . . you'll be walkin' right into the snare," the Mountain King said. "Like a dumb animal . . . about to have its throat cut."



"I'm going to go to the Lodge," New told him. "I decided when I was sitting out there, waiting. I'm going to find out what's inside. You know that, don't you?"



"I . . . feared it. Boy . . . if I could stop you, I would. I'd do anything to stop you. But . . . I'm all used up. I'm tired. I've passed the wand to you, and told the tale. The rest is . . . on your shoulders."



New could feel his grip weakening. The old man whispered, "Lizbeth . . . who's to take care . . . of Lizbeth now?"



He was slipping away. The core of ice inside New suddenly cracked. What would the words hurt? he asked himself. And then he said softly, "I forgive you."



The Mountain King's hand strengthened again, for just a second or two. "I'm . . . gonna turn loose now." His voice was barely audible. "I want you to go out . . . and tell 'em the Mountain King wants to rest."



"Yes sir."



The old man opened his hand - and his arm slithered down, hanging off the bedside.



New thought he could still hear him breathing, but he wasn't sure. Thunder vibrated over the valley, shaking the windowglass. New backed away from the bed, and quietly left the room.



"I want to go somewhere to be alone," New told Raven in the waiting room. "I need to do some thinking."



"The Democrat office is just down the street. There won't be anyone there this early. Do you want me to take you?"



He nodded, and then went over to his mother. "Ma?"



She flinched, her hands folded prayerfully in her lap.



New gently touched her cheek, and when she looked up at him, there were tears in her eyes. "I want you to take the truck and go home," he said. "Will you do that?"



"Not without you. I'm not goin' anywhere without - "



"I'm the man of the house now, Ma. You told me that a hundred times. If you want me to be the man, I've got to act like one. I've got to make my own decisions. There's a storm comin'. I want you to take the truck and go home." He could easily make her do it, he knew. It would take no more than a mental shove. He almost did it - almost - but then he said, "Please."



She started to object; then she saw the man in her boy's eyes, and stopped. "All right," Myra said. "All right. I'll go home. But how will you - "



"I'll make out."



Myra stood up, looked from her son to Raven Dunstan and then back to New again. "You will. . . come home too, won't you?"



"Yes ma'am. I'll come home."



She took the keys from him and went out of the clinic under a sky that churned with stormclouds.



New stood at the door until she'd driven away. "What's on your mind?" Raven asked him.



"Huntin'," he answered calmly. "I've got to figure out how to make a snare of my own."