Chris Grabenstein - The Hanging Hill

Grimes nodded. The symbolism made sense. “And this final course? The meat?”

“To pay patronage to Hecate, goddess of sorcery, you must eat her favored earthly animal. You must eat flesh from the corpse of a dead dog!”

He wished he hadn’t asked.

38

Meghan, Zack, and Zipper backtracked, made their way up the dimly lit maze of corridors.

Zipper barked.

“Lead the way, Zip!”

The dog took off.

“See, Zack?” said Meghan. “I told you we’d have an adventure down here!”

“We should’ve brought a flashlight!”

“What about that? That magic fairy wand or whatever. Maybe the star lights up.” She pulled the prop wand out of its bin. “There’s a switch on the handle.” She flipped it back and forth. Nothing happened. “Batteries must be dead.”

“Whack it on the bottom a couple times. It’s how I get my flashlight to work at home.”

Meghan whacked it.

The sparkling star glowed.

“Help!” Derek’s voice was weaker now.

“Hang on!” shouted Zack.

“We’re coming!” added Meghan.

They rounded a final corner and raced down a steep ramp that switched back a couple of times before it entered a storage vault at least fifty feet tall and wide.

“So, the basement has a basement!” said Meghan. “It’s probably where they store the huge set pieces. Then they use a freight elevator or something to hoist stuff up to the stage.”

“Zack!” Derek whimpered. “Tell your dog to stop licking me!”

Meghan swung her wand light to the right.

Derek was cowering on the cement floor, trying to cover up with his elbows so Zipper couldn’t slobber all over his face.

Zack stared up at the giant creature that had terrified Derek.

“Wow!”

It had to be at least twelve feet tall. A gargantuan brass statue of a man who had the head of a bull. Mr. Bull Head was seated on a throne with his hands held out in front of him, palms up, like he was waiting for someone to toss him a basketball.

“I couldn’t see where I was going and bumped into that thing!” Derek explained. “When I looked up …”

“You screamed like a baby,” said Meghan. “Don’t worry. I would’ve done the same thing.”

“Yeah. Me too,” said Zack. “This guy’s got some nasty nostrils.”

All three of them studied the colossus.

“I wonder what show they used it in,” said Meghan.

“Was there ever a Bulls?” asked Derek. “You know, like Cats?”

“I don’t think so,” said Meghan. “It’s so huge! It looks like it might be from an opera.”

Zack heard someone sobbing.

From the look on her face, he could tell that Meghan heard it, too.

“What’s wrong?” Derek asked.

“Someone’s crying,” said Zack.

Derek looked at them both like they were crazy. “What? Where?”

Meghan and Zack both held a finger up to their lips, urged Derek to keep quiet.

He stayed where he was.

They crept around the brass man’s big sandaled feet. Zipper padded along after them

Whatever was behind the statue wouldn’t stop weeping.

39

The four men stood holding hands in a circle around the ghost light at center stage.

Grimes wished he had a toothbrush. He still tasted the canine carcass.

“Repeat after me,” Hakeem instructed. “Ego sum te peto et videre queo!”

“That’s Latin.”

“Of course.”

“Well, what does it mean?”

“Did you not read The Book of Ba’al?”

Grimes hesitated. “I skimmed some sections.”

“So I feared. Ego sum te peto et videre queo: I seek you and demand to see you.”

“I seek you and demand to see you.”

“In Latin, please.”

“Ego sum te peto et videre queo.”

“Louder.”

“Ego sum te peto et videre queo!”

“Again!”

“Whose spirit are we summoning?”

“Let us start at the top of your grandfather’s list. Mad Dog Murphy.”

“Who’s he?”

“Convicted bank robber. Murderer. Died in the electric chair in 1959.”

“What do we want with him?”

“Repeat the words.”

“First you tell me why we would want a murdering bank robber!”

“Because he is very good at his job!” said Hakeem. The other two men sniggered. “Repeat the words!”

Grimes felt the warmth of power surging through his body. Jolts of adrenaline rippled up from his hands as he clutched the hands of the two brothers of Hannibal. Who were these people? Why did they make him feel like he could soar through the air like an eagle, commanding all those below? Like his lame arm would somehow grow strong enough to wield a terrible swift sword and fell any who stood in his way?

“Ego sum te peto et videre queo!” he cried “Mad Dog Murphy! I seek you and demand to see you!”

“Louder!”

“I seek you and demand to see you! Now!”

The bulb atop the ghost light exploded.

Sparks arced up from the exposed filament.

Electricity crackled across the air, igniting a roaring thunderclap. Four lightning bolts collided at center stage with the screech of steel wheels screaming to a stop in a train wreck.

A monstrous man strapped in a wooden chair suddenly materialized in the air. He floated ten feet above the floor, bobbing like a tossed boat on a churning sea.

“Where am I?” the beast in the chair bellowed.

“Are you the spirit of Mad Dog Murphy?” Grimes demanded.

“Yeah, yeah. Sure. Where the blazes am I?”

“Where I summoned you!” answered Grimes, feeling more robust and vital than he had ever felt in his life.

He was his grandfather’s rightful heir.

He was a true necromancer!

40

Zack heard a muffled boom somewhere right above his head.

He figured it must be a summer thunderstorm.

He and Meghan and Zipper continued creeping around the base of the giant brass statue.

They reached the back.

The girl hidden in the darkness continued to sob and moan and weep.

Meghan flicked on her illuminated wand.

A young Native American girl, maybe twelve, stood in the shadows, tears streaming down her face. She wore a fringed buckskin dress decorated with beadwork, and cradled a dozen ears of dried corn tight against her chest.

“Are you a demon?” she asked Zack in a quavering voice.

Zack shook his head.

The girl turned toward Meghan. Shook and sobbed. “Are you a demon?”

“No. I’m Meghan. Meghan McKenna. Who are you?”

The girl couldn’t answer. She convulsed into another spasm of sobs.

“What’s wrong?” asked Zack. “Does something hurt? Are you in pain?”

The weeping girl nodded. As she did, her head seemed sort of loose and rubbery on her neck.

Zack glanced down at the floor. The girl was standing in the center of an area squared off by the stumps of four rough beams. Maybe sawed-off support posts from an old foundation. Wormy six-by-sixes.

Now he heard footsteps.

“Hey … who are you guys talking to back here?” It was Derek.

“My father curses this ground!” the girl cried out. It was hard to understand what she was saying, because she kept sobbing the whole time she talked. “I did not steal this corn! We gave you demons the seed; how could we steal that which we gave you?”

Zack wished he knew the answer, but he didn’t, so he gave the ghost a pleading shrug. Meghan did the same thing.

Zipper sank to the floor and whimpered.

The girl wailed the most mournful cry Zack had ever heard in his life, worse than a million funerals all mixed together.

Then she and her corn crumbled into powdery dust and disappeared.