Three Flashes
Vera’s flashlight carved a narrow, trembling tunnel through the Bay Valley library’s main hall at 7:05 PM, the beam sweeping across towering shelves crammed with leather-bound volumes—Dissection of the Canine Heart, Bovine Pathology, Local Flora of the Northeast—their spines cracked, gilded titles dulled under decades of dust thick as grave-soil. The air was heavy with mildew and the faint, sweet rot of forgotten paper, the checkered tile floor scuffed but unmarked by blood or struggle. Nothing moved. No overturned cart, no shattered glass beyond the earlier window, no sign of Eleanor Hawthorne. Only silence, oppressive and watchful.
Vera’s pistol stayed low, her bandaged hand steady despite the throb in her thigh. Kane Baker flanked her, axe resting lightly on his shoulder, his boots soft on the tile, eyes scanning every shadow between the stacks. They moved in practiced tandem, the earlier clang and scrape still echoing in their ears, a lure or a trap. The main hall yielded nothing—no body, no clue, just the vision’s shelf mocking them from the far end, its veterinary texts a dead end.
They pressed deeper, past the circulation desk—its surface bare save for a returned book, Maritime Law, spine cracked open—and into the attached residence, a narrow corridor paneled in dark wood that smelled of lemon polish and cold tea. The kitchen came first: cabinets ajar, a single teacup cracked on the counter, its saucer missing; the sink dry, a faint ring of brown at the bottom. Vera swept the beam under the table—nothing. Kane checked the pantry, his axe nudging cans of peas and beans—empty, undisturbed.
“Vera,” Kane whispered, grabbing the sheriff’s attention, “Over there!”
He gestured at the living room, and she nodded affirmatively, and they made their way into the space.
The living room opened beyond: a threadbare afghan askew on a floral couch, one slipper lying by the cold hearth, its mate nowhere. A small television sat dark in the corner, rabbit ears bent. Vera’s light danced over framed photos—Eleanor young, stern, beside an older man who must have been Elias—then to the rug, its pattern faded but unmarked. Empty. The air here was colder, the windows sealed, the silence deeper, as if the house itself held its breath.
Kane’s memory sparked, sharp as the axe’s edge. “Back room,” he whispered, his voice low, urgent. “Eleanor went for the magnifying glass—said it was in the back.”
Vera nodded, her flashlight swinging to a half-hidden door behind a leaning stack of encyclopedias, its hinges rusted, the wood warped from damp. A low scrape leaked from below—deliberate, like furniture dragged across stone—followed by a muffled thump that vibrated up through the floorboards. Vera’s pistol rose, her stance shifting to high-ready; Kane’s axe lifted, the blade gleaming in the dim light. They exchanged a glance—wordless, synchronized—and moved, Vera’s free hand easing the door open with a groan that echoed like a warning.
A narrow staircase descended into darkness as the hinges protested, the sound abnormally loud in the silence, the air below mustier and colder, smelling of old ink and earth.
Together, they went down, flashlight beams jittering across cobweb-covered walls and crates, boots soft on the creaking wooden steps. The stairs groaned under their weight, each creak a potential alarm. Halfway down, the scrape came again—closer, rhythmic—then silence. Vera’s pulse thrummed in her ears; Kane’s breath was steady, hunter’s calm.
At the bottom, a blinding light flared—white, searing, straight into Kane’s eyes. The world dissolved. He was back in the dream: preacher in black by the moonlit river, the jar of golden light pulsing in his hand, Moriah’s crimson eyes smiling as she took it, vanishing into smoke. The light, the smile, the bargain—Everything happened in what was a flash, but for Kane, it felt like minutes had sped by in real time.
“KANE!” Vera’s shout cracked like a gunshot, raw with alarm. Her pistol swung up, finger on the trigger, the beam of her flashlight merging with the blinding source.
“Wait!” A voice—familiar, urgent—cut through the glare. “It’s me—Kivior!”
The light lowered, revealing Kivior Thames at the base of the stairs, flashlight in one trembling hand, his Bible clutched in the other, his preacher’s coat dusted with cobwebs and archive grime. His face was pale, eyes wide with the same shock that had seized them. “Sheriff—Kane—I didn’t hear you come in.”
Vera lowered her pistol slowly, exhaling a breath that was half-fury, half-relief, her heart still racing. “You trying to get shot, preacher?” she snapped, but her voice softened, the scare bleeding out.
Kane blinked hard, the vision gone in a heartbeat—the jar, the river, Moriah’s smile evaporating like mist. No one noticed the trance; his face was stone, the axe steady.
“After reading the note,” Kivior explained, his voice steadying, “I couldn’t wait another second or let another day pass after that massacre at the precinct. Thought to come alone—search Elias’s private archive. Seems we all had the same idea.”
Vera holstered her pistol, the tension easing into a fragile alliance. “In that case, we should team up,” she said, her tone decisive. “Three lights, three weapons. We’ll move much faster and cover more ground this way. Find something—anything—before Moriah’s next move.”
Kivior nodded, his flashlight beam joining theirs as they spread out among the basement’s chaos—crates of yellowed ledgers, shelves of sermon notes, a desk buried under maps of Greenly Bay from 1913. Vera rifled through a drawer, finding only ink pots and quills; Kane nudged a crate, revealing town records;
Kivior scanned a wall of bound journals, his lips moving in silent prayer.
Then—CRASH. A heavy thud from upstairs, directly above the main hall, followed by the unmistakable jingling of bells—soft, insidious, the same sound that had haunted Kane’s childhood nightmares. The three beams snapped upward in unison, the basement stairs groaning under unseen weight, dust sifting from the ceiling like grave dirt.
“Someone else is in here,” Vera said.
“Unless someone followed you guys in here, there’s no other living person inside this place. I’ve checked everywhere.”
Vera’s pistol rose again, Kane’s axe was gleaming, Kivior’s Bible clutched tight, the jingling swelling into a chorus above—the library alive with the curse’s next, hungry move. Whatever it was – human or otherwise, something was waiting for them.