This is stupid. It’s all so stupid. Ian keeps whispering that word to himself—stupid stupid stupid—in an effort to combat the dread that keeps finding new depths for his stomach to drop to. He doesn’t like this. Not this room, this building, this park, this contest. He turns to leave but trips on old cans of paint left here. They must have been used to paint the mural.
He goes back to the black hole at the center of the maze picture, shines his light right on it. And…he was right. It is a hole! Someone left this here deliberately, added it after the fact. Which means it’s part of the game. Which means…
He takes a deep breath and reaches inside the hole, ready to have his arm bitten off or mangled or something. But his fingers come down on something dusty and rectangular. He knows a book when he feels it.
“Ha!” he shouts, then cringes as it echoes off the walls and ceiling. “Ha,” he repeats in a much softer voice. He found the book. He found the fucking book. But it’s too late to hurry back to the camp. He settles in the darkest corner of the building, beneath a pile of the roof materials that will shield him from view if anyone comes inside, and examines his prize.
The cover is old, the leather cracked and worn. The pages inside feel brittle, and he can’t quite believe they’ve managed to survive the elements. As he opens the book, several pages fall free, and he sets them carefully in his lap.
His triumph surges as he reads a blue ballpoint inscription on the front inside cover of the old book.
She must have known I was against her, because she threw me in here with the beast. But she didn’t know I had the book with me already. Maybe they are all in on it, though. I stay hidden for fear of both them and the beast. One and the same, really. It doesn’t matter. I’m out of time to find a solution in these pages, to find an ending to this nightmare. I cannot stop it, and I will be consumed.
I deserve it. We all do. I’m sorry. May you do what I could not. And if you are reading this, Linda, I hope you rot in hell. I’ll be waiting there for you.
Linda! So this is the book. Of course it’s the book, and Ian’s going to get the bonus. He hopes it’s cash, but he’ll even take an advantage. Maybe he really can win this thing.
Eager, Ian turns the pages. The writing changes immediately, old and faded, spidery flourishes neater than any modern writer could do. It’s all Greek to him—literally. He’s pretty sure, at least. Someone has made detailed translation notes in the margins. Ian flips through, faster and faster. There, a diagram that matches the patterns and symbols he saw on the entrance gate. There, plans for a building. It sort of looks like a miniature temple, with more diagrams of symbols and patterns. And then, at the end, more Greek, pages of it, pages and pages.
Ian doesn’t like this book. It’s not funny, or cheeky, or inspiring, or frankly helpful. Is he supposed to do something with it? Is there a further task besides finding it?
Ian should read the transcription. He should. Maybe there are clues.
But this doesn’t feel like a prop. This isn’t something thrown together by a sporting goods company. He knows books—they’re the only thing he knows, really—and this book is old. Ancient. It doesn’t belong in a stupid hide-and-seek game. He pauses on the last drawing, a depiction of something monstrous, something that doesn’t belong anywhere.
Shuddering, he turns to the papers that fell free from the book. Maybe those are the clues.
He reads, and he wishes he hadn’t.
JULY 5, 1925
The means by which we intend to make the sacrifice and the methods we discovered are detailed in Tommy’s book, but they do not matter right now.
We only want our families to understand: We have lived through the great war, and we fear others looming on the horizon, and we refuse to watch our children suffer and want and struggle and die the way we watched our brothers and sisters and parents. If making this choice means we protect our town and our children—our blood, our people—and ensures that our lines carry on stronger, our names marching forward, growing and building and becoming our dreams made real, then we are satisfied that our sacrifice is worthwhile. Who wouldn’t sacrifice all for their children?
Know this: We are making the deal, and we do not know what the cost is, but we will pay it and send our love to you down the generations.
We leave Hobart Keck as witness, and in charge of administration. Individual notes from couples to follow; please see that our children receive them, and take care of our little ones as you would your own, knowing what we have done.
Solemnly,
Tommy and Mary Callas
George and Alice Pulsipher
Orville and Ethel Nicely
Willie and Ruth Stratton
Joel and Mary Young
Robert and Rose Harrell
Samuel and Irene Frye
JULY 10, 1925
We finished Tommy’s temple last week and the gate this morning, built and placed and sealed and protected as detailed by Tommy’s careful notes, though I cannot see the sense in any of this. They designated me the witness and I don’t know what they intend me to witness other than fourteen desperate fools go into the woods and make themselves silly with chanting and spells.
Still, Tommy is my brother, if not by blood then by choice, so I’ll do as they ask and write it all down and at the end when they’re red-faced and humiliated I’ll have whiskey waiting.
JULY 13, 1925
Tomorrow is the day. I’ve strict instructions not to interfere, no matter what I see or hear or how long it lasts.
The little ones have been divvied up among relatives. Mary, who has shed buckets of tears over little Tommy Junior and his weak lungs, did not so much as cry, which makes me suspect they do not think this will work, and if it does, they do not think the cost will be so high. Today they are bathing together, purifying themselves, and I can’t look at any of them without laughing, so I’m going to sit in the corner pretending to take down serious notes for their posterity.
Tommy is never going to live this down. I’ll see to it. We’ll be old men and I’ll ask if he’s preparing to summon an ancient power every time he goes in a pool.
JULY 14, 1925
Well, I’ve sent them into the forest and closed the gate behind them. Seven days, they told me. Maybe they want a holiday away from their children. Easier ways to do it than creating an elaborate ceremony based on secret writings found in a burned-out church in the middle of no-man’s-land.
I’ve set myself up a nice camp near the gate. I don’t mind sleeping outside when no one is shelling or gassing me. I’ll drink coffee and sleep under the stars for a week, and when they trudge out, I’ll only mock them a little.
But I cannot fail to remark on this: They took a cow with them. Why did they take a cow? Tommy shook his head and told me not to think about it as they walked past, leading a cow.
I can think about nothing else, now. Why did they take a cow?
JULY 15, 1925
I cannot—
I have to gather my thoughts but my fingers are trembling
There was a noise.
No not a noise the opposite of a noise like the ringing absence when a shell has gone off nearby and all sounds are cut off and you don’t know if they’ll ever return or if you’ll forever exist in this ringing pulsing void cut off from the world around you