Chapter 28: The Old Ways Die Hard

Elliot POV

The scrying bowl showed me everything I needed to know.

Silver light exploding from the forest clearing. My son's hands intertwined with the Decker woman's. Power flowing between them in ways that should have been impossible under the covenant's constraints.

I swept the bowl from my desk, sending black water and bone fragments scattering across the Persian rug. Sixty-one years I'd maintained the balance in Thornwick Hollow. Sixty-one years of careful cultivation, of feeding the ancient hungers that kept our community prosperous and protected. And now my own flesh and blood threatened to destroy it all for the sake of pretty eyes and soft skin.

"Thomas," I called.

Thomas Grant appeared in my study doorway within moments. The old funeral director had served my family since my father's time, and his loyalty was absolute. More importantly, his connections to the neighboring covenant communities ran deep.

"Yes, Mr. Ashworth?"

"Send word to the valley settlements. Tell them we need representatives here by tomorrow night." I moved to the window, looking out over the town I'd spent my life protecting. "The ritual proceeds as planned, but we may need additional... support."

"How many should I expect?"

"Everyone who can make the journey. The Blackwood clan from Wyoming. The Torrino family from Colorado. The Danes from northern Idaho." I turned back to him. "And Thomas? Make it clear that this isn't a request."

He nodded and withdrew. I poured myself three fingers of whiskey and settled into my father's chair, the same one where I'd learned the weight of leadership at eighteen years old.

The covenant network stretched across seven states, connecting isolated communities bound by similar pacts. Each family line had their role to play, their sacrifices to make. But the Thornwick Hollow arrangement was the oldest, the most powerful. The keystone that kept all the others stable.

If it fell, they all fell. And the things we'd spent generations keeping at bay would be free to walk the earth again.

My phone rang. Henrik Hansen's name on the display.

"Elliot, we have a problem."

"I'm aware of the problem, Henrik. What's your assessment?"

"Martha saw the light from her kitchen window. Says it felt like the mountain itself was singing." His voice carried the strain of a man pushed beyond his comfort zone. "Whatever your son and the girl did out there, it's got the whole town on edge."

"And the entities?"

"Restless. I can feel them pressing against the barriers, testing for weakness." Henrik paused. "They're hungry, Elliot. Hungrier than I've ever sensed before."

Of course they were. The covenant had promised them sustenance every twenty-seven years for over a century. Miss a payment, and the debt collectors would come calling.

"Double the ward patrols tonight. I want every protective circle checked and reinforced." I swirled the whiskey in my glass, watching the amber liquid catch the lamplight. "And Henrik? If you see my son, don't engage. Let me know immediately."

"You think he'll try something before the ceremony?"

"I think he's already tried something. The question is whether he's prepared for the consequences."

The line went dead. I opened the bottom drawer of my desk and withdrew a leather-bound ledger that hadn't seen daylight in three decades. The names of every covenant keeper across the mountain west, along with their debts, their obligations, their weaknesses.

Margaret Riley's death in 1982 had required assistance from four neighboring communities. The girl had been unusually strong, unusually resistant to the binding rituals. We'd nearly lost control entirely before the Blackwood matriarch arrived with her blood-work specialists.

This Decker woman would be worse. I'd sensed it the moment she set foot in Thornwick Hollow. The power radiating from her was raw, untrained, but vast. Like a dam about to burst.

Under normal circumstances, that would make her the perfect sacrifice. Entities preferred their offerings to have substance, spiritual weight. But if she'd learned to channel that power through my son...

I reached for my phone and dialed a number I hadn't used in fifteen years.

"Blackwood residence." The voice was female, elderly, carrying the authority of someone accustomed to being obeyed without question.

"Eleanor. It's Elliot Ashworth."

A pause. "Elliot. It's been some time."

"Too long. I need your help."

"Do you? How interesting. Last time we spoke, you were quite insistent that Thornwick Hollow could handle its own affairs."

I bit back the first response that came to mind. Eleanor Blackwood was older than me, more experienced, and commanded resources I couldn't match. Antagonizing her would serve no purpose.

"Circumstances have changed."

"I'm listening."

I explained the situation—Holden's defection, the Decker woman's growing power, the accelerated timeline that left us vulnerable to federal interference. Eleanor listened without interruption, but I could feel her calculating, weighing the political implications of intervention.

"You're asking me to risk my community's stability to clean up your family's mess," she said finally.

"I'm asking you to protect an arrangement that benefits us all."

"And if I refuse?"

"Then the Thornwick Hollow covenant fails, the entity breaks free, and every pact from here to the Pacific Ocean becomes void." I let that sink in. "Your grandson James just turned sixteen, didn't he? How confident are you in his ability to handle unfettered supernatural forces?"

Another pause, longer this time. "We'll be there tomorrow night. But Elliot? This makes us even for the Torrino incident. After this, you handle your own problems."

The line went dead. I set the phone aside and returned to my whiskey, already mentally cataloging what needed to be done.

The ritual chamber beneath the observatory required preparation. Additional binding circles to contain multiple participants. Protective wards strong enough to hold entities that hadn't manifested in the physical realm for decades. And weapons, in case my son forced the issue.

I walked to the gun safe hidden behind my bookshelf and withdrew the Colt .45 that had belonged to my great-grandfather. The bullets were silver, blessed by three different covenant communities and inscribed with symbols of binding. They wouldn't kill Holden—his supernatural heritage made him too resilient for that—but they would incapacitate him long enough for the ritual to proceed.

The thought of using them made my chest tight. Whatever his flaws, whatever his misguided romanticism, Holden was still my son. Still the last of the Ashworth line after Marcus's death.

But the covenant came first. It always had.

My reflection in the safe's mirror showed a man who'd aged decades in the past week. Gray hair, deep lines around my eyes, the weight of responsibility etched into every feature. I looked like my father had the night before he'd completed his first ritual, all those years ago.

"It never gets easier," he'd told me then. "But it gets necessary."

A knock at my study door interrupted the memory. "Come."

Paige Elliott entered, carrying a leather satchel that smelled of herbs and old blood. Her eyes held the fevered gleam of someone who'd stared too long into supernatural depths.

"The binding materials are ready," she said. "Enough to constrain both the girl and your son, if necessary."

"And the substitution ritual?"

"Prepared. If the girl proves... uncooperative... I can take her place." Paige set the satchel on my desk. "The entities won't know the difference until it's too late."

I studied her face, looking for signs of doubt or hesitation. Found none. "You understand the risks?"

"Better than most. I've been preparing for this opportunity for thirty years."

The opportunity. As if ritual murder was some kind of career advancement. But then again, perhaps it was. For Paige, the covenant represented power that had been denied to her gender for generations. The chance to claim immortality for herself rather than simply facilitating it for others.

"What about Agent Barrett?"

"Neutralized. He thinks he's working with me to save the girl." Paige smiled, and there was nothing human in it. "He'll realize his mistake at the most dramatically appropriate moment."

"And Sarah Riley?"

The smile faltered slightly. "Still missing. But she's one old woman against an entire community. Whatever she's planning won't matter."

I wasn't so sure about that. Sarah had survived an encounter with the covenant that should have killed her. That suggested either extraordinary luck or extraordinary preparation. In my experience, luck was rarely extraordinary.

"Double the perimeter watches," I said. "I want to know if so much as a field mouse crosses into our territory without permission."

Paige nodded and left. I returned to my window, watching the town settle into evening routines that had remained unchanged for decades. Children walking home from school. Shopkeepers closing up for the night. The comfortable rhythms of a community that understood its place in the larger order.

Tomorrow night, that order would be tested. Either the covenant would continue as it had for over a century, or everything I'd spent my life protecting would crumble into chaos.

The whiskey burned as it went down, but it couldn't warm the cold that had settled in my bones.

At eleven PM, the first of the outside visitors arrived. Three black SUVs with tinted windows, moving through the town like funeral processions. The Blackwood clan, Eleanor's people. I watched from my window as they parked behind the old church and began unloading cases that probably didn't contain Bibles.

By midnight, the Torrinos had arrived from Colorado—a family known for their expertise in binding reluctant sacrifices. An hour later, the Danes from Idaho, bringing with them the kind of weapons that worked on supernatural targets.

The house felt different with so much concentrated power in town. The air crackled with potential energy, and shadows moved in ways that had nothing to do with lamplight. By dawn, Thornwick Hollow would be the most magically fortified location in the mountain west.

And hopefully, it would be enough.

I was reviewing the ritual preparations one final time when the temperature in my study dropped twenty degrees in as many seconds. Frost spread across the windows, and my breath came out in white puffs. The whiskey in my glass turned to slush.

They were coming.

The entities that fed on the covenant's offerings, drawn by the concentration of power and the promise of imminent satisfaction. I could feel them pressing against the boundaries between worlds, testing the barriers that held them at bay.

One of them spoke, its voice like grinding stone: "The compact must be honored."

"It will be," I said aloud, knowing they could hear me. "Tomorrow night, as agreed."

"The blood has been corrupted. The vessel resists."

"The vessel will comply. I'll see to it personally."

A different voice, this one like winter wind: "If the compact fails, the debt passes to you."

I knew what that meant. If Rosemary Decker escaped the ritual, if the covenant's promises went unfulfilled, the entities would claim their due from the covenant keeper instead. From me.

"The compact will not fail."

But even as I said it, I felt the cold truth settling in my bones. My son's defection had damaged more than just the ritual's emotional components. It had weakened the supernatural architecture that bound the entities to our agreement. They were no longer certain of their payment.

And uncertain entities were dangerous entities.

The cold retreated as suddenly as it had come, leaving my study warm but somehow diminished. The entities' attention had moved elsewhere, probably to probe other weak points in our defenses.

I reached for my phone and called Thomas Grant.

"Move the timeline up again," I said when he answered. "The ritual happens tomorrow night at moonrise, not midnight."

"Sir? That's barely twenty-four hours. The preparations—"

"Will be ready because they have to be ready." I looked out at the town where dark shapes now moved between buildings, patrolling like sentinel guards. "The entities are manifesting early. If we don't feed them soon, they'll take matters into their own hands."

"And if your son interferes?"

I touched the silver bullets in my pocket, cold metal against warm skin. "Then I'll handle my son."

The line went dead. Outside my window, something that might have been a wolf but moved wrong padded down Main Street, its eyes glowing with hungry intelligence. Behind it followed shadows that had no bodies to cast them.

Tomorrow night, one way or another, the covenant would be fulfilled. Even if I had to drag my son and the Decker woman to the altar myself.

The old ways had served us for over a century. They would serve us still.