“Dad, we can’t. Not here. It’s too close to—”
The older man cuffed his son with his free hand, never taking his eyes off me as he did. “Quiet, boy. Did I give you permission to talk.” He hadn’t phrased it as an actual question.
But his son answered all the same. “No, sir.”
“Kids…” the mine owner sighed. “Now, Wayland, normally I’d be mighty curious as to what had you bring us out here, but the amount of trouble you nearly caused me last time has me thinking maybe it’s just wiser for me to kill you here and now.”
Tap. Tap. Tap.The steady rhythmic noise echoed through the cavern. Then it developed into the more familiar knocking from the stories.
I couldn’t help it—I broke out into laughter.
The mine owner scowled. “Stop that, you fucking nut. You know what that is?”
“Yeah, payback, and it’s a paranormal bitch.” I flashed the pair a toothy grin.
The knocking loudened. It quickened. And soon enough, it evolved into a thunderous drumming.
“Dad?” The boy’s eyes widened as he fumbled on his person for something. The flashlight slipped from his hands, hitting the ground hard enough to shatter its lens.
“Jimmy!” his father barked, turning the gun from me toward his best guess as to where the sound was coming from. Too bad the noise echoed from every direction.
I let out a low, maniacal cackle. “It’s too late. They’re all around us.” As a rule, people don’t do well when confronted by the paranormal in the dark.
The mine owner whipped back around to face me, his eyes as wide as his son’s. “What the hell did you do? You crazy—this thing’ll kill us all.”
I smiled. “I thought that for a moment, then I realized something: you had to tie Wayland up, leave him beaten and broken almost as an offering, but you were there too. Old Jeremiah has been after you the whole time. When his spirit couldn’t have you, he went for what was left, I wager. But now I’ve got you here.”
A wet, gurgling noise filled the immediate area, and Jimmy finally managed to pull free his snub-nosed revolver. It didn’t do him much good, as the same dark silhouette from earlier, managing to cast a shadow in the dark, grabbed hold of the boy.
“Dad!” The scream was cut short as Jimmy vanished from sight.
His father spun, loosing shots into the blackness.
All of which gave me a moment to pull one last trick. I laid out the photo of Wayland and his son, muttered the words like I had for Jeremiah, then pulled out a match.
The mine owner fired one last shot before fishing out a speed revolver to reload. Then he turned to me. The revolver shook in his grip, but not so much that he’d miss. “Call it off. Call it off!”
“Can’t do that, boss man. You made that tommy-knocker. You and your boy, I’m guessing. Years of ripping off hardworking guys. Putting their lives at risk. Then taking some yourself. It’s mad, and there’re only two things it wants.”
Somewhere in the cave, his son’s cries reverberated. “Maybe one more if you don’t do something.”
“You bastard!” The man thumbed back the hammer just asanother scream rolled through the mine. Then he turned and fired indiscriminately down the darkened way.
It bought me just enough time to finish what I’d planned to do. “Never bring a gun to a match fight.” I kindled a flame, touched it to Wayland’s photograph, and gently spoke another invocation.
And the mine answered.
A knocking. It then evolved into drumming, and the wrathful spirit of Wayland Keeney arrived. A blackened shade bearing a gaunter version of the man’s original face.
“Way…land.” The old mine owner barely managed the name just as the wronged spirit dragged him away. Gunshots peppered the cavern, drowning out the screams. But eventually, the thundering stopped, and so did the man’s cries.
I sighed before pushing myself to my feet, then began the slow, short walk to the nearby chapel to close my case.
Church waited for me with a patient look of expectation on his face. “Vincent.”
I grunted. “You wanna explain what was up with that case?”
He quirked a brow in what could have been confusion, but we both knew he understood what I meant.
