“Damn you, Posey,” Jack cried. “Run! You can’t fight them.” Jack looked torn between jumping down to save Posey and staying on the ledge to keep whatever small advantage he had.

  “Marius,” Robert ordered. “Stop the idiot before it is too late.”

  Marius Trello rolled his head, a film clouded his eyes and he squinted. He started to get up and fell back onto the chair with a thump. He would stop no one. The liquor and the drugs had finally taken affect. Stan jumped up and ran toward Posey as Andy was free and throwing aside the pieces of severed rope.

  “I’ll not be robbed by a simple-minded fool.” Stan’s face twisted beyond recognition.

  Chester grabbed Stan, jerking him to a sudden stop.

  “No. Touch him and you lose everything. Farley Pritchard made his own deal with the Master.”

  “He is right,” Andy cried. “I saw it plain as anything. None of you can hurt Posey.”

  Jessie shot a glance at Jack to see what he made of this new development, but he was gone! Andy and Posey worked on Jessie’s ropes while Stan, wild-eyed, gestured toward Melanie and Denise.

  “Then they must do it.”

  In a daze Melanie staggered toward the dagger that glittered on the rock floor. Denise, white with horror, came to help her. The last of Jessie’s ropes slid off. She rolled to the side of the altar and jumped down beside Posey and Andy. Posey pulled Andy toward the opening into the old mine. Jessie turned to fight and hold off Melanie and Denise until Andy was safe.

  “Leave them, Mother. We only have to keep away until after midnight,” Andy yelled as Posey lifted him and shoved him through the split in the rock. Jessie wanted to obey, but the two women were too close, and the others were coming to aid in her recapture. Suddenly Posey was at her side, his round face smooth and guileless as the moon. He stared at The Group. The men fell back. Only Melanie and Denise came on.

  “You go,” Posey smiled and held his pitifully small knife before him. “You be gone before these can get past.”

  Jessie was exhausted and confused. She had been ready to die if it would stop The Group, but now with a chance to survive it was different. New decisions were needed. Her escape was at hand, but it meant leaving Posey alone to face Melanie’s cruel weapon. He was strong, but maybe not strong enough to overcome both Melanie and Denise. And what about Stan and Denise? There might be hope for them now.

  Jessie could not decide whether to save herself, or stay and help Posey. Then, before she realized that she had made a decision, Jessie swung her fist at Melanie.

  Jessie struck Melanie below the ear and Melanie went reeling to one side. At the same time Melanie’s stiff, outstretched arm swung in a wide arc and the tip of the dagger slit Jessie’s shirt, grazing her ribs. While Melanie struggled to regain her footing Jessie stooped to the cave floor and her hand closed around a rock. When Melanie lunged in another attack Jessie brought the rock up, slamming it against Melanie’s head. There was a sickening crunch. Melanie’s face went slack, her knees buckled, and she fell to the rock floor.

  Posey had been holding Denise at bay with his pocketknife. Denise circled away from Posey and ducked in to pick up the dagger that Melanie had dropped. Then she came at Jessie, ready to finish the job that Melanie started.

  Posey stepped in front of Jessie. He danced from one foot to the other, making threatening little gestures toward Denise with his knife. His heavy shoulders shook and he whimpered. Perhaps it was true that the agents of evil could not touch him, but neither did Posey seem capable of killing any living thing.

  Denise dodged from side to side in an effort to get past Posey. Then for an instant Denise trembled, she looked bewildered and scared. Jessie longed to take her in her arms.

  “Denise, don’t. Please, come with me.” Jessie held out her hand to the girl.

  Then, like a storm cloud sweeping across the sun, a darkness moved over Denise’s face. Her lips pulled back in a snarl. Denise lunged forward and slashed the palm of Jessie’s hand with the dagger.

  “Mother,” Andy cried from the crevice. “Leave, now!”

  Andy’s cry triggered Posey. He turned and plodded toward the opening. As Posey departed The Group closed in to help Denise. Jessie hesitated a second and then flew toward the fissure where Andy and Posey waited. Behind her Stan and Denise were in the lead, their grasping hands raking the air only inches from her shoulders.

  “Forget them.” Robert shouted. “Time is running out. We still have the proper sacrifice. The blood kinship is the important factor. We must not miss the moment.”

  Posey’s strong hands jerked Jessie up onto the ledge and dragged her through the opening. She looked back into the glowing, pulsing red cavern and cried out in agony.

  Stan and the nine other black-robed members were swooping down on Denise. The anguish and terror on Denise’s face would live in Jessie’s heart so long as it beat.

  Jessie struggled to turn back. But Posey held her fast and dragged her down the crevice to the mineshaft. Denise’s screams came in waves. They bounced off the cavern walls and shot through the honeycombed mountain like the rush of a flash flood. The sound burst a fireball of pain in Jessie’s mind.

  As Andy, Posey, and Jessie moved into the tunnel darkness closed in upon them and it was difficult to see which direction to go. Jack was waiting for them. When he had realized there was a chance for their escape he rushed to relocate his detonation point. Jack urged them forward and guided them toward the tunnel entrance. Their feet pounded the tunnel floor and raised a choking dust, but Jack yelled for them to hurry, to “Run for your life”.

  They reached the tunnel entrance in seconds, it seemed. Jack shoved and pushed at them, scattering them out into the moonlight.

  “Run!” he commanded. “Don’t stop.”

  He waved frantically urging them away from the mouth of the tunnel. As they fled, Jack bent over and touched the two wires to the battery terminals. Immediately the bowels of the earth rumbled with a great thundering boom! Jessie turned to look back up the hill to the tunnel entrance. Jack was thrown backward, but he scrambled to his feet and began to run down the hill toward the valley.

  The explosion sounded muffled, like a gigantic thump that set off a roaring chain reaction. The inside of the mountain ruptured, collapsing in upon itself. For an instant an angry, red fiery mist rolled deep within the tunnel, lashing a shiny coil toward the entrance. Then it was sucked back and the tunnel filled with falling rock.

  The valley shook under their running feet. The tremor vibrated up through Jessie’s legs and set up a quiver in her stomach. Jack stumbled and fell to the ground. He clawed at it trying to regain his footing. Jessie ran back to help him and together they ran on to where Andy and Posey were waiting. Posey had his arms around Andy and they both looked dazed and frightened.

  Behind them the mountain came down, with a deafening roar.

  Rock and dirt filled the mouth of the tunnel. The stunted cedar trees that grew on the bluff slid down the face of the cliff as if they were on a conveyer belt. They piled up at the foot of the cliff and were quickly covered with boulders and tons of dirt. On the cliff top the castle ruin was flatted as if a giant hand had crushed the gray rock walls. Stones flew off the bluff and bounced down the crumbling mountain.

  Dirt clouds boiled into the blue-black night and blotted out the stars, while the rumbling of the shifting, moving earth sent out a constant, thunderous drum roll. The mountain changed size and shape before their eyes.

  The interior fissures and caverns had collapsed letting the cliff break and fall away. The steep, high bluff changed to a sloping hillside that stretched its foot out into the valley. At the top the castle was gone, along with the cars that had been driven there from the lodge.

  Nothing remained.

  It was a great new mound, ragged and raw, covered with huge, thrust up squares of limestone, gravel slides, and tons of clay. It swelled up and then fell in like a monstrous soufflé. The initial explosion and the following roar left a dull ringing in Jessie’s ears. The four survivors huddled in the valley and stared at the changed skyline. They each wiped dust, sweat, and tears from their faces. Andy moved to Jessie’s side and slipped his small trembling hand into hers. A few feet away Jack bent over, his hands on his thighs, and took in rasping gasps of air.

  “Won’t know till morning if we got ‘em sealed up.” Jack’s short, clipped words sounded as if they cost him a great deal of pain.

  Posey hunkered against a white oak, pressed into the tree as if the living wood offered him protection.

  “Boy, Jack. You sure did it this time. Tore up the whole mountain, you did.”

  “What do we do now?” Jessie asked.

  “Get the hell out of here.” Jack answered.

  Posey turned and started plodding toward his home. He looked back over his shoulder at them.

  “Posey’s hungry. Didn’t have no supper.”

  Jessie thought they should run, there was no way of knowing what might be coming after them, but they were exhausted.

  They walked single file through the meadow and on into the woods. Jessie tramped along behind Jack and Andy. The cut in her palm was caked with dirt, but it still dripped blood. And the shallow cut across her ribs oozed and stung. These were the only sensations that seemed real to her. It was too much to think about how she had received these injuries. Each time a thought tried to form it was washed away by a wave of overwhelming terror.

  She shuffled along in a dream state. Her mouth hung open and her arms dangled limp at her sides. Up ahead Posey was walking fast nearly lost among the black trees. Jack and Andy followed Posey in a stumbling half run. Of them all Posey was functioning the best. She, Andy, and Jack were stunned and dazed. The dark realm had touched them. It had sucked them in and for a time had held them in a rotten, putrid embrace. None of them knew when those evil arms might again reach out and claim them. The night wind brought an icy terror to Jessie’s heart.

  When they stumbled through the back door of Posey’s small house he was already putting kindling in the firebox of the old iron stove. A small pile of potatoes waited on the cabinet beside the sink. Jessie clutched the back of a kitchen chair and stared down at the oilcloth covering the table. Then becoming aware of Posey’s outstretched hands she lifted her head.

  Posey handed her one of the potatoes and a paring knife. Jessie took them but she held them as if they were objects from another planet. Posey lifted his lips in a smile.

  “Posey don’t cook so good for company.”

  His hopeful pleading and gentle prodding broke Jessie. She fell onto the chair, buried her head in her hands and wept.

  While Jessie cried no one moved. Her jagged sobs rose and fell in the silent kitchen. The tears came in torrents. They mixed with the blood on her hands and filled her palms with a small pink lake. At last, she stopped. She was drained, empty as a cup turned upside down.

  Jessie went to the sink where she began to wash her hands and face. When she finished, she started peeling the potatoes.

  It was three in the morning by the time the toasty aroma of perking coffee floated through the small house. Then they sat down to a meal of fried potatoes and scrambled eggs. When they finished eating, Jessie and Andy bedded down in Posey’s room. Jack made a pallet of quilts on the front room floor and Posey slept on the couch.

  Above the white frame house, that stood in the forest clearing, the moon traversed a sky filled with dust and fading stars. And the world slowly turned, searching for the sun. While far up the valley the mountain continued to settle and shift; adjusting to its new conformation, and to the buried creatures that clawed and dug deep within its belly.

  Chapter Forty-Three

  It was noon when Jessie awoke. She was alone and sat up with a start, searching for Andy. When he came through the bedroom door she wilted with relief. He carefully carried a cup of coffee to the bedside and stood there as Jessie took a sip.

  “Are the others up?” she asked.

  “Yes. We let you sleep. I’ve had breakfast and Posey has gone to work.”

  Every inch of Jessie’s body ached, but the hot coffee helped ease the pain. She got out of bed, set the cup on the dresser, and looked in the mirror. She and Andy both looked like war refugees.

  “Posey went to work?” Jessie said. “Why?”

  Andy shoved his hands into the pockets of his dirty jeans and shrugged. “Guess that was the only thing he could think of to do. Are we going back there, too?”

  “I don’t know.”

  Jessie ran her fingers through her hair. Andy’s question brought on a thousand others. How could they explain the disappearance of thirteen people, or why Jack blew up an entire mountain? Jessie sat on the edge of the bed and motioned for Andy to sit beside her. But Andy stood before her, his thin shoulders straight and square. He resisted her open arms and planted his grimy sneakers firmly on the linoleum. His stance gave him an older more determined appearance. Jessie folded her hands in acceptance of his new maturity.

  “I don’t know what we are going to do, Andy. Would you like to go back to Florida?”

  “No. I like it here. Posey is a good friend and we have Jack, and if we leave... who will keep watch?”

  Sunbeams slanting through the lace curtain played across Jessie’s back, the heat puckering her skin like slivers of ice. Who indeed!

  “The others, they aren’t dead. Are they, Andy?”

  Andy licked his cracked lips and shook his head.

  “No. They want out. I was sitting on the back steps while Jack made coffee and I saw it. Clear as I saw Posey coming to get us...”

  As she waited for Andy to go on Jessie’s chest filled with lead.

  “... They can’t die for a long, long time,” Andy continued. “I can’t get a good picture of what happened, but the sacrifice had to be made right at midnight. If they used Denise and got it done, then ten of them are still alive. When we were in the cave I couldn’t tell you what I knew because if they found out I saw so much they might have tried another trick. They were stalling with Jack, telling him to blow it up anytime. They knew he wouldn’t. They were going to rush him at the right time, if he didn’t leave first. It was Posey coming in that saved us.”

  “Will they dig their way out?” Jessie dreaded the answer.

  Andy wrinkled his forehead. “I can’t see that part. That is why we have to stay. If we go and they do get out they will come for us.”

  The coffee in Jessie’s stomach churned in sour waves. It wasn’t over, never in their lifetime would it be over. What a rotten, lousy way to live. Maybe Andy could go away, try to live a normal life, she and Jack could stand guard and then warn him if they did work free.

  “Don’t send me away.”

  Jessie stiffened, Andy knew. His powers were either changing or increasing.

  “I’ll be happy here. I can go to school and Jack can teach me lots of things. You’ll see, I’ll get bigger and stronger, then I can take care of you better.”

  The burden of raising a child with such abilities seemed an impossible task. Jessie took a deep breath. She would take it easy; go a step at a time.

  Andy smiled encouragingly.

  “Come on, Mom. Let’s go talk to Jack, he’ll help us decide what to do.”

  Jessie had slept in her shirt and underpants. She picked up her jeans from the chair beside the bed and put them on. They would have to go back to the lodge, for clean clothes if for no other reason.

  Jessie and Andy found Jack in the kitchen washing the last of the breakfast dishes. His clothes were dirty, but he had shaved and his hair was damp and neatly combed. Actually, he looked better than they did.

  “High time you was up. Want something to eat?”

  Jessie shook her head. “I don’t think so.”

  “Okay then, you feel up to going back to survey the damage?”

  Jessie shivered. “Do we have to?”

  “You bet,” Jack nodded, a lock of hair swung down over his eyes. “Me and Andy been having a talk. I might be getting the hang of his strange ways. The minute I saw Posey I knew what Andy was waiting for. When I realized they couldn’t touch him, I took off and set my stuff up in the tunnel. Those creeps had my number. Much as I wanted to I couldn’t have blown it with you still in there. Anyway it worked out okay, didn’t it boy?”

  Jack clapped his hand on Andy’s shoulder and the two of them smiled at each other. Jessie wasn’t sure how she felt about this new comradeship.

  “You are sure in a good mood,” Jessie said. “I don’t suppose you have thought of the repercussions this will bring. Denise is probably dead, and Stan is ...” Despite crying so much the night before, tears sprang to her eyes.

  “I’m sorry, Jessie. But you lost them a long time ago. Something went bad in them. You got to start thinking about it that way. And if I’m acting too happy, I am sorry. I can’t help it. I finally put those bastards in the ground. Oh, I know I probably didn’t kill them. What I saw before, and what Andy has said, convinced me of that. But there is a damn good chance they will never get out. And a man like me learns to be grateful for success no matter how small. So, get yourself together. We got to see how the land lays.”

  THE UPPER VALLEY WAS a new and strange terrain. A great sloping mountain stood where the cliff had been. Its top was lower and it filled part of the valley with rubble. No blade of grass or even the tip of a cedar tree poked through the raw, red hillside. The wash of fresh earth and rock covered everything, the wreck of Jack’s truck and the mineshaft entrance. The cliff top was rounded and bare, not a sign of the cars or the castle. Jack studied the crest of the mountain.

  “Looks like it hid everything. Covered a multitude of sins, you might say.” Jack grinned, his brown eyes twinkled.

  Andy laughed and took Jack’s hand as they began walking. Jessie couldn’t join in their happiness. The horror of what was buried, and the possibility of it coming to light, kept her tight-lipped and grim. They picked their way along the bottom of the slide and rounded the end of the valley where the river flowed from its underground source. When they reached the river’s bank they stopped in stunned surprise. They were on the edge of a wet gravel bed, and out in the middle was a stream the size of a small sluggish creek.