The Witch at Sparrow Creek: A Jim Falk Novel Read online

  The Witch at Sparrow Creek

  Hippocampus Press Fiction

  W. H. Pugmire, The Fungal Stain (2006)

  ———, Uncommon Places: A Collection of Exquisites (2012)

  Franklyn Searight, Lair of the Dreamer: A Cthulhu Mythos Omnibus (2007)

  Edith Miniter, Dead Houses and Other Works (2008)

  ———, The Village Green and Other Pieces (2013)

  Jonathan Thomas, Midnight Call and Other Stories (2008)

  ———, Tempting Providence and Other Stories (2010)

  ———, Thirteen Conjurations (2013)

  Ramsey Campbell, Inconsequential Tales (2008)

  Joseph Pulver, Blood Will Have Its Season (2009)

  ———, Sin and Ashes (2011)

  ———, Portraits of Ruin (2012)

  Michael Aronovitz, Seven Deadly Pleasures (2009)

  ———, The Witch of the Wood (2014)

  Donald R. Burleson, Wait for the Thunder (2010)

  Peter Cannon, Forever Azathoth: Parodies and Pastiches (2012)

  Alan Gullette, Intimations of Unreality (2012)

  Richard A. Lupoff, Dreams (2012)

  ———, Visions (2012)

  Richard Gavin, At Fear’s Altar (2012)

  Jason V Brock, Simulacrum and Other Possible Realities (2013)

  S. T. Joshi, The Assaults of Chaos (2013)

  Kenneth W. Faig, Lovecraft’s Pillow, and Other Strange Stories (2013)

  John Langan, The Wide, Carnivorous Sky (2013)

  Simon Strantzas, Burnt Black Suns: A Collection of Weird Tales (2014)

  Rhys Hughes, Bone Idle in the Charnel House (2014)

  Donald Tyson, The Lovecraft Coven (2014)

  J. R. Smith, A Confederacy of Horror (2015)

  The Witch at Sparrow Creek

  ————————————

  A Jim Falk Novel

  Josh Kent

  Hippocampus Press

  —————————

  New York

  The Witch at Sparrow Creek: A Jim Falk Novel copyright © 2015 by Josh Kent.

  This edition copyright © 2015 by Hippocampus Press.

  Published by Hippocampus Press

  P.O. Box 641, New York, NY 10156.

  http://www.hippocampuspress.com

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this work may be reproduced in any form or by any means without the written permission of the publisher.

  Cover art © 2015 by Jason C. Eckhardt.

  Cover design by Barbara Briggs Silbert.

  Hippocampus Press logo designed by Anastasia Damianakos.

  First electronic edition

  1 3 5 7 9 8 6 4 2

  ISBN: 978-1-61498-142-8

  Contents

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Epilogue

  The Witch at Sparrow Creek

  Prologue

  James walked along the path with his father. His father had his hands on Jim’s shoulders, pushing him along. There was no moon that night, and the woods around them were black. James couldn’t tell if his eyes were opened or closed. The woods were so quiet. Their feet crunched along in the snow. Sometimes, ahead, he thought he heard a laugh or a whisper from the trees.

  Soon he could see a dim and dancing yellow glow—the small, fluttering light of Old Magic Woman’s fire that he’d seen so many times before of an evening. This night, at the sight of the glow, James’s stomach twisted and his head filled with a stuffy heat.

  Ithacus Falk felt his boy hesitate on the path in front of them.

  “James,” he said, “do not be afraid. You must do this thing.” He pushed him along.

  “Pa,” James whispered as the light of the fire grew orange and spread through the snowy trees, “what happens?”

  “No one can say, but you will soon see,” Ithacus said, and a small smile came to his face in the dark.

  “And you did the same—you did the same?”

  “Yes, boy, the same, but it is not the same for everyone. Now hush.”

  James could see the fire reaching toward the dark branches in the clearing ahead now. This fire was much, much larger than a normal camping fire, and there was a special kind of shape around it made by logs. The logs crossed one over the other, forming a crooked circle that went around into the center of the bright fire. A tall shadow was standing there, the flames curling and flowing behind it.

  Jim stopped all of a sudden, and his father nearly pushed the boy face first into the snowy path.

  “I don’t want to,” Jim said.

  “James, you will, you will see, you must pass through this.”

  James didn’t understand any of this, but he didn’t know what to say or how to say it. He only knew that he wanted to go back, back through the forest, back up the mountain road, back through the field and into his warm bed at home—yes, but that wouldn’t be far enough away. James wanted to go back into the past. He wanted to go back before the witch, before his mother died, to sit again on the woven rug in his parents’ home while his father stoked the fire and his mother boiled water for coffee. He wanted to run so fast that no one could see him anymore. If only there was a hole out there somewhere in the moonless forest, a hole that he could dive down into and go through to the land of the past, if only he could . . . Especially if it meant that he would never again arrive at this place, this moment, this shadowy fire in the night.

  He peeped open his eyes through his hands and squinted at the blaze as his father moved him forward again. The figure standing by the fire was not Old Magic Woman. The figure was too tall to be any person and had long, crooked arms that reached from the shoulders nearly to the ground. The flames showed that the figure’s face was like a mountain cat’s, but from either side of the head came long, twisting antlers.

  James felt a cold come into his chest.

  “What is that, Pa?” James asked as the dizzy feeling came over him again. Beside the figure he could see now were standing four old men, Old Magic Woman’s people, the Katakayish people of the woods and rivers, those people sometimes called the First People or the River People. Four Katakayish men stood around the fire, each one in a shiny costume of leaves, beads, feathers, fur, and jewels, each man’s beads and jewels shining out in a single color of his own, black, yellow, blue, and red. They were all wrinkled with graying hair, but they looked strong and fierce because the Katakayish people were strong. It was also said, however, that they were passing away.

  When they saw little James and his father approaching, Black and Red got out their drums and Blue put a flute made of bones and sticks to his old lips. The drums pattered and then started into heartbeats beating as the flute twittered high and low, winding its way around and through.

  Then Yellow began to sing in the language of the River People, the language of the Katakayish people, which Jim had learned from Old Magic Woman and from his father, but the words were terrible and the man’s voice grinded in the fire and snow.

  When Eyabé came to the mountain

  Kitaman with flaming teeth

  Set upon him to devour

  Flesh by flame

  Flesh
by flame

  When Eyabé came to the mountain

  Kitaman with razor rocks

  Set upon tear to pieces

  Skin from blood and blood from bone

  Skin from blood and blood from bone . . .

  James entered the circle around the fire with his father. The drums pounded ever louder, ever faster. The four old men started to dance with jagged, jerking motions, twirling and bending, following one another around and around the fire in a right-handed circle while Yellow sang his song of Eyabé and Kitaman.

  The beast with the antlers and the cat’s face could only be Kitaman! James remembered Kitaman from the stories Old Magic Woman had told him and his father. Kitaman was the one who came at the end to take you by flame into the dark world forever. Suddenly its arms moved and rose high with flaming claws. Kitaman took two wide steps aside, and behind him was a kind of table made of grasses and ropes and sticks. The table was in the same shape as the base of the fire, the crooked circles inside of circles made from the ropes and branches.

  The creature set its flaming hands to the table, and licks of red and yellow fire started spitting out from the sides and spilled up into the trees.

  James knew that the grass table was for him and that he was going to the flames and that Kitaman would feast upon him.

  James’s body felt stiff and he tried to scream, but only a harsh whisper came out of his mouth.

  Then he managed to wriggle out of his father’s grasp. Ithacus raised his hands and then reached them both out to his son. He looked at his son’s wide-open eyes as they looked about this way and that, first at the dancing men, then at the fire, then at Kitaman, then at Ithacus. But little James didn’t look his father in the eyes.

  “You must not fear!” his father shouted over the drums and over the flute and over the singing of the terrible song. “You must not fear!”

  But little James looked at the fire and the big monster and saw teeth and eyes glitter in the firelight and heard the old man voices singing the terrible song.

  “Skin from blood and blood from bone!”

  His father reached out to grab him, but little James was quick and he spun and ducked and left before his father could turn. Little James Falk was wailing and tearing off down the path, disappearing from the light.

  “No! No! No! No!” James was shouting into the night.

  His father stood staring a long while as the men began to notice the object of their ceremony was missing. Yellow stopped singing, and then the drumming stopped. He looked at the others; Blue started to smile and giggle. It wasn’t the first time he had seen a little boy run off into the forest, afraid to become a man. But Yellow fiercely shushed him and waved his arms and pointed to the boy’s father. Blue put his hand over his mouth, but his eyes still smiled.

  Ithacus looked down the path, waiting, waiting for his son to return. The fires on the ends of the arms of the cat-beast dwindled, and then the long arms folded and broke in the middle and dropped to the ground. The beast collapsed in a slow way, and two human hands reached up and took away the face and antlers, and Old Magic Woman stepped out of the shaman trappings she wore and walked to Ithacus’s side.

  She looked into the darkness with him for little James. “Another day, maybe, another day.”

  Ithacus looked at the ground, watching as the flames made their shadows dance in the cold, black night.

  “Another day,” he said.

  Chapter 1

  Spencer Barnhouse pushed his glasses back up his nose and wiped his forehead. He knew Jim Falk had got him into a place that he was probably not going to get out of alive.

  Maybe if someday he saw Jim on the other side, maybe at the very end, or maybe in the Straightway . . . maybe they’d let old Spencer Barnhouse give this boy a good one in the jaw. That would make him happy. He’d owed many things to this boy’s father, but now that his father had disappeared, what was he doing?

  Spencer rolled the barrel of powder slowly and quietly into the shadows of a storehouse and waited among some left-around crates. He was sure someone was watching him from the far end of the docks, but if he kept quiet long enough, maybe they’d go off. Or maybe they’d figure he wasn’t up to much but drinking and wandering about looking for trouble. Especially if he acted none too worried about watchers and concentrated on a flask and a smoke. He did just that. Sitting on top of the barrel in the dark, he rolled some tobacco in paper and lit it up. He took long slow puffs and then produced a silver flask from his coat and pulled a long drink from it, screwed the cap back on, and stuffed it back into his breast pocket. He shifted a few times in the moonlight, making sure to keep his eyes out over the black water and away from where he sensed his watcher stood. Then Spencer stood and stepped slowly out to the edge of the dock where the ship was. He leaned on a post and smoked, making sure not even to glance in the direction of whoever it might be that was eyeing him.

  Moments ago, Jim Falk had grabbed a mess of special weapons and other items off this boat and stolen off into the dark corners of Hopestill, just as they’d planned. Now Spencer hoped to explode the little cargo boat into pieces: maybe they’d think it was done by good, common thieves and that the weapons had been lost in the blast, not stolen. Maybe.

  But who was this watching him? Jim Falk had finally got Spencer in a spot. Sure, there were plenty of others around who might take up the task of exploding one of Varney Mull’s ships in the dock, out of spite or even for sport. To some folk in Hopestill, Varney was just another villain in power—a man who gave out work and money, but a man whose generosity was thin compared to his greed. There was a high price for any favors granted, and Mull had no issue with collecting his tolls.

  Spencer sucked on the glowing little roll of paper between his fingers. It was then he figured one of Varney’s men had stepped out of some hiding place at the far end of the docks and begun to walk not too quietly in Spencer’s direction. He was coming straight at him. Spencer was going to have to acknowledge him, look up and make some greeting, and that was just what the man needed. He wanted to see Spencer’s face so if he ran into him on some other night and in connection with some other slightly questionable events . . . some other night when there’d be more than just this one man against Spencer.

  He’d hurried to get it done. He could have thought this through and been long gone before the boat exploded, he could have done so many other things, but Falk appeared out of nowhere and was in such a damned hurry. Spencer cursed his luck and cursed Jim Falk. He’d hurried to get this thing done for Jim. It was weapons Falk needed and right away, but these were Varney Mull’s weapons he’d stolen.

  “Why can’t you make it a business of forging your own, Falk? You’ve got time on your hands. Learn a trade, for the love of your father . . .” Spencer spoke in a plain, calm way even when he was irritated.

  “No time, Barnhouse, no time,” the outlander said. “No time now. No time before. Especially not now. There’s not time enough in the world to do all the things. You do the things you must while you have time.”

  “You seem to know just how to twist the words of your father to fit your design,” Spencer said and finished the bottle of whisky they’d been sharing. Falk had said “no time,” but Spencer knew there was a lack of ability and an utter lack of patience and discipline that was more than likely behind Jim’s helplessness and urgency. There was something else too.

  “You know what’s at stake here,” Jim said and peered with his strange blue eyes deep into Spencer’s own pale ones.

  “Do I now? Better question yet, do you?” Spencer asked. He stood, pulled another bottle from the shelf, and poured a full glass for himself. “Jim, it’s been so long since I’ve talked of any of these things—these things we’re talking about. Sometimes I doubt if I ever saw them in the first place. If it wasn’t for your father and, well, what he’s left us . . . Now you’re having visions of red-headed women and ghosts and birds.” Spencer laughed, but not very much and not very hard. “Maybe I th
ink you’ve chewed too many of those green leaves of the Katakayish people, Jim. Maybe you spent too much time with old women in the woods. Maybe your father was more of a storyteller than we think.” Spencer again tried to laugh, but couldn’t. Even as the words left his mouth, he knew that he did not mean any of them. In a way he wished it were true that he didn’t believe. He wished that he didn’t believe in spooks or witches. He wished that he didn’t know there was that certain darkness that Varney Mull used to control the ports and pubs of Hopestill. But Spencer Barnhouse had more than belief. He knew. He knew because he had seen. He knew, but he wished he could be like those who didn’t know and only believed. If he only believed, maybe there might come a day when he forgot, or when he doubted enough to forget. But for the memory of Ithacus Falk . . . and here was little James Falk, not so little anymore. Here was Jim Falk and not for the first time. Here was Jim Falk asking some fool favor. Asking Spencer to put his life in danger. He wasn’t sure why he didn’t just turn this fool out into the night.

  Spencer gulped the whisky and smashed the glass into the fire. He spat and shook his head, leaning forward with his left hand out touching the portrait of Ysabel Barnhouse. He looked at her picture, her black hair and half-smile, and the cold pain of her loss churned inside him.

  Jim sat there watching the old bookkeeper walk about in the dirty library office. He tried to keep his head up on his shoulders and his eyes open and reached slowly for the whisky Barnhouse had poured for him. He took a sip and then downed the rest, worrying a bit that he might slip into that place where his memory went out entirely, but he was really not too worried about that.

  Barnhouse turned to Jim. “How many of them are left?”

  Jim said, “I don’t know. I told you I don’t know. I can’t remember everything all the time like you. These visions I’ve been having don’t allow for a lot of exact measuring. Also, they’re not exactly about them. They’re focused on this redhead woman and a church on fire. Last I can think though and remember, there were more than enough that my pa knew about. He’d catalogued them somehow. But those things are supposed to be all lost, now aren’t they?”