“Great,” Freya said, when Trinity took her leave. “If Mimi took Molly, they’re halfway around the world by now, and she could have given her to Helda already in exchange for whoever she wanted out of there. How long do you think it will take us to get to Cairo?”
Ingrid shook her head. “We don’t have time for that right now. We’ll deal with that later. Right now we need to find Lionel. Emily just texted me. She thinks she might have spotted him out on the farm.”
“That’s a relief,” Freya said.
“No, you don’t understand—all the animals on their farm are dead, and she thinks Lionel might have killed them.”
chapter thirty-five
The Covenant of the Dead
Lionel Horning and Emily Foster lived in an old farmhouse on land that had once been part of his grandparents’ dairy farm, and the two artists had a small menagerie, with chickens, goats, and a milking cow. Lionel had converted the house to a loftlike space where they lived and worked. When the sisters arrived, Emily was waiting for them with tea and biscuits. “Thanks for coming so quickly—how did you get back here so fast? I thought Ingrid said you were in the city?” she asked as she poured them each a cup of tea.
“We were on our way back when you called,” Freya said smoothly. There was no need to explain how the closet in her room made traveling from North Hampton to New York as easy as walking down the hallway.
“When did you discover the animals?” Ingrid asked.
“This afternoon. When I went to refill the water for the chickens.” Emily’s hands shook so badly that her teacup rattled in its saucer. “I was going to call animal services but I thought you might want to take a look.”
“There’s no time like the present. Let’s go,” Freya said a tad impatiently, standing up. It was so North Hampton of Emily Foster to offer them tea and make polite chitchat when they were there to figure out if her husband had turned into a bloodthirsty zombie. Emily led them out through the back door toward the barn.
“Hold on. . . . What is that? Can you hear it?” Freya asked. “Like rushing water underground.” She knelt down to touch the ground; the earth felt damp and the rumble grew louder.
“It sounds like waves,” Ingrid agreed.
“It’s the underground river that runs directly underneath the barn,” Emily said. “In the 1850s a well was built on this site. I can’t believe you can hear the water. I’ve never heard it myself. Lionel claimed he could feel it surging when he painted, but then again Lionel said a lot of things,” she said, walking up to the barn door. She wrapped her fingers around a brightly galvanized handle and pulled. The big door heaved and began to move sideways on a metal track. It rolled for a moment and then stopped. Emily grimaced. “You might want to hold your breath. The smell is disgusting. Anyway, if you just slip in and move along the wall for a few paces there should be a light switch on your right-hand side. Just be prepared. I would come with you, but I just can’t go in there again.” She turned and quickly backed away from the door, wiping her hands on her jacket twice and then shaking them in the air as she walked away. Freya saw her heave a sigh of relief as she exited the barn.
Ingrid’s face puckered. A sickly sweet smell drifted out from inside the barn, acrid and rotten. “You first,” she told her sister.
Freya smirked as she slipped slowly through the opening. It was dark inside. In the dim light she could see there was some kind of mound on the floor, but it was too dark to make anything more out of it. She felt something brush her left shoulder and shivered, but it was just Ingrid inching into the room next to her.
“The switch,” Ingrid whispered. Freya was already reaching sideways with her right hand, feeling up and down the wall in broad arcs. Her fingers scraped the wall as she searched for the little toggle.
“What is that?” Ingrid asked. The mound at the far side of the room was clearly moving, its surface undulating, but maybe it was a trick of the light. “Can you just get the damn lights turned on!” Ingrid begged, wishing they had thought to bring their wands.
Freya’s finger finally hit the trim plate. The switch clicked, and there was a pause as the ballast in the old fluorescent light buzzed and cracked before kicking on. The light blinked and finally the room was awash in a pale bluish glow.
The mound at the far end of the room turned out to be a pile of torn and bloody animal carcasses, fur and feathers mixed with blood and entrails in a chunky soup of rotting flesh. Blood splattered the walls and floor and tiny maggots crawled over everything. Freya tried not to vomit and Ingrid blanched at the sight.
“That’s enough,” Ingrid said, looking sick. “Let’s get out of here.”
Emily was waiting for them outside and rolled the barn door closed. “Sorry you had to see that.”
“So what makes you think Lionel did that?” Ingrid asked, as Emily led them to a second, smaller barn that housed the artists’ studios.
“This morning I was by the window, washing dishes, when I thought I saw a man outside. It looked like Lionel from behind, so I called out to him. He didn’t turn around, but he’d been acting so strange since he got back from the hospital so I let him be.”
“How long has Lionel been missing now?”
Emily looked embarrassed. “A few weeks. Almost the entire month. Since right before the Fourth of July he said he hasn’t been feeling well. Then that Friday I came home from the market and found everything in disarray.” Pulling the door open, she led them inside the cozy farmhouse to the back where Lionel kept his studio. “I’m sorry I didn’t say anything earlier but he does this once in a while.”
Tacked on the far wall were several large-scale canvases showing a silver gate, the mountain high above the hill, trails that led to unknown paths, eerily specific to the Kingdom of the Dead. One of the canvases was torn, and there was paint splattered over the canvas in a haphazard motion, in contrast to the almost photographic quality of the painting underneath.
“But you didn’t come see me until the next week,” Ingrid pointed out. “Why not?”
Emily shrugged and righted a chair. “He’s a bit absentminded and we give each other a lot of freedom. We don’t need to check in with each other. I thought maybe he’d gone to the city—he sometimes stays at the Chelsea Hotel—but I called over there and he wasn’t registered and no one at his gallery has seen him either. That’s when I started to worry. There’s been no activity in his accounts, and it’s not like him to be gone this long. I was sure he’d be home by now. Then this morning, I thought he was back and wanted to check on the animals. I sort of forgot about it. . . . I’ve been working, so I’m a bit distracted as well. . . . Then this afternoon when I saw what was back there. . . . I’m kind of freaked out.”
“Is there somewhere you can go? I think it’s best if you don’t stay here,” Ingrid said.
“I could go to my sister’s, I guess. Ann’s in Wainscott; it’s not too far. Why? You don’t think he would come after me, do you? I’m not even sure it was Lionel, it might have been someone else.” She shook her head. “You think this might have had something to do with what your mom did to Lionel?”
“Emily . . .”
Emily balled up her fists. “It’s all my fault. I asked for the help.” She seemed to have an internal struggle with herself. “I’ll go to Ann’s.” She looked at the sisters plaintively. “You’ll try to find him? Maybe help him? Don’t hurt him, okay?”
They tried to assure her that all would be well as they bade good-bye. When they were alone in the car, Ingrid exchanged a look with her sister. The heads of all the animals were torn off, their entrails severed. “If something went wrong with his resurrection, it’s possible that he’s now trapped between life and death,” she said. “He’s alive, but his body is decomposing and he’ll need to . . .”