The Sorrows Read online

  Dedication

  This book is for you, Grandma. I’d have never written this story or anything else without your love and constant support. Thanks for always believing.

  Acknowledgements

  Thanks to my wonderful wife and my three amazing children for letting Daddy go upstairs to write. Thanks to Don D’Auria for being a fantastic editor and a patient guide. Thanks to my readers Clay and Melissa for their honest feedback. And finally, thanks to Stephen King, Jack Ketchum, Richard Laymon, Ray Bradbury, Ramsey Campbell, Peter Straub, Richard Matheson, and Joe R. Lansdale for inspiring me and for showing me the way.

  “Look about you, Clarke. You see the mountain, and hill following after hill, as wave on wave, you see the woods and orchard, the fields of ripe corn, and the meadows reaching to the reed-beds by the river. You see me standing here beside you, and hear my voice; but I tell you that all these things—yes, from that star that has just shone out in the sky to the solid ground beneath our feet—I say that all these are but dreams and shadows; the shadows that hide the real world from our eyes. There is a real world, but it is beyond this glamour and this vision, beyond these ‘chases in Arras, dreams in a career,’ beyond them all as beyond a veil. I do not know whether any human being has ever lifted that veil; but I do know, Clarke, that you and I shall see it lifted this very night from before another's eyes. You may think this all strange nonsense; it may be strange, but it is true, and the ancients knew what lifting the veil means. They called it seeing the god Pan.”

  Arthur Machen

  “The Great God Pan”

  Part One: Ben

  Chapter One

  On the way up the mountain, Ben Shadeland flirted with the idea of killing Eddie Blaze. The problem was, Ben could barely breathe.

  “Good Lord,” Eddie said. “You sound like an obscene phone caller back there.”

  Ben ignored him. Between ragged breaths, he asked, “We still on your dad’s land?”

  “Only a small part is residential. Sonoma County owns the rest.”

  Ben looked around. “So we’re not supposed to be here?”

  “Not after dark,” Eddie answered, and in the moonlight Ben saw him grin.

  Great, he thought. Trespassing on government land at one in the morning. Trekking around the wilderness was fine for hard-core fitness freaks, but for out-of-shape guys in their late thirties, this kind of hike was a surefire ticket to the ER. If a heart attack didn’t get him, a broken leg would.

  As if answering his thoughts, Eddie said, “Want me to carry you?”

  “Go to hell.”

  When Ben risked a look ahead, the toe of his boot caught on something. He fell awkwardly, his outstretched palms pierced by thorns. He lay there a moment, riding out the pain but relishing the momentary rest.

  “You still alive?”

  Rather than answering, he rolled over and examined his torn palms. The blood dribbling out of his wounds looked black and oily in the starlight. He rubbed them on the belly of his shirt and pushed to his feet.

  When they reached the cave Ben had to kneel for several moments to avoid passing out. This was the price he paid, his only physical activity lifting weights and chasing his three-year old son around the yard.

  Of course, that was before the divorce. Now he only played with his son on weekends, and when he did he was haunted by the specter of returning Joshua to his ex-wife. The lump in his throat caught him off guard.

  He spat and glanced up at the cave. “So what’s the story?”

  “It’s a good one,” Eddie answered.

  “It better be.”

  “Come on,” Eddie said and switched on a large black Maglite.

  “You had that all along?”

  Eddie started toward the cave.

  “What, we’re going in?”

  “Don’t you want to retrace Arthur Vaughan’s steps?”

  He stared at Eddie, whose face was barely visible within the cave. “You’re kidding.”

  “I knew that’d get your attention.”

  Hell, he thought and cast a glance down the mountain. It wasn’t too late to go back. He thought he remembered the way, though he’d been too busy trying not to break his neck to thoroughly memorize the terrain.

  “This is perfect,” Eddie was saying. “One of the most prolific serial killers in California history?”

  “I’m not in the mood for a cannibal story right now.”

  “The deadline’s in two months.”

  “I know when the deadline is.”

  “Then stop being a pussy and come on.”

  With a defeated sigh, he did.

  Immediately, the dank smell of stagnant water coated his nostrils. As he advanced, he couldn’t shake the sensation of sliding into some ancient creature’s gullet, a voluntary repast for its monstrous appetite. The cave serpentined left and right, and several times branched into different tunnels. Ben was reminded of all the horror movies he’d seen with cave settings.

  They never ended well.

  At least the tunnel was large enough that he could stand erect. In addition to his fear of heights, sharks, and his ex-wife, he was deathly afraid of tight spaces. He remembered fighting off panic attacks whenever he ended up on the bottom of a football pile.

  So why the hell was he going to a place where his claustrophobia could run amok?

  Because they were desperate.

  “Arthur’s first two victims,” Eddie said, “were a couple of teenagers named Shannon Williams and Jill Shelton. They were out here hiking and decided to explore the caves.”

  It was actually Shannon Shelton and Jill Williams, but Ben let it go. Eddie was a good storyteller as long as one didn’t get too hung up on facts.

  “Little did they know,” Eddie said, “they’d wandered into the den of a beast.”

  Despite the fact that they’d mined for inspiration in eerie places several times, Ben felt the old thrill. Sometimes the tale inspired him, sometimes it was the setting. Often, the music didn’t come until days later, when a specific memory triggered his imagination.

  Lately, it didn’t come at all.

  “Who was murdered first?” Ben asked.

  “Don’t rush it,” Eddie said. “I’m coming to that.”

  They moved up a curving incline that, to Ben’s infinite dismay, narrowed gradually until he had to shuffle forward in a stooped position. When the tunnel opened up, he groaned.

  The gap between where Eddie stood and where solid ground resumed couldn’t have been more than five feet, but to Ben the space yawned, terrible and forbidding, an impassable expanse.

  “This was where she fell,” Eddie said, gesturing with the Maglite into the darkness. “Jill made it over, but Shannon ended up down there.”

  Ben stood next to Eddie and peered into the chasm. The flashlight’s glow barely reached the bottom. He estimated the distance was sixty feet or more.

  The image came unbidden, but once it settled in his mind, it dug in with the tenacity of a tick. He imagined the poor girl leaping and realizing halfway she wasn’t going to make it. The hands scrabbling frantically on the grimy cave floor. The amplified scraping of her body as it slid downward. A fingernail or two snapping off. Then the endless, screaming tumble into the abyss.

  He hoped it killed her. Goodness knew being eaten alive by Arthur Vaughan was a far worse fate.

  “You ready?” Eddie asked.

  “Hell yes,” he answered. “Ready to go back.”

  Without another word, Eddie leaped over the expanse and landed with room to spare.

  “Your turn,” Eddie said.

  “I’m not jumping.”

  “Scared?”

  “I don’t have a death wish.”

  “It’s only a few feet.”

  “And a hundred more to the ground.”

  “Stop letting fear rule your life.”

  Classic Eddie. Put him in a bad situation and mock him for reacting sanely. Like last month, the double date that turned out to be a pair of hookers. What’s the difference? Eddie had asked.

  So Ben sat there listening to one girl’s stories about her clients’ sexual quirks while Eddie got it on with the other in a hot tub.

  “Look,” Eddie was saying. “I went first so you’d know it was safe.”

  Ben turned. “I’m going home.”

  The cave went black.

  “Your choice,” Eddie said. “Either jump a gap a child could clear with his eyes shut or take your chances alone in the dark.”

  Ben ground his teeth. Arguing with Eddie Blaze was like chasing a candy wrapper in a windstorm.

  “Go ahead and leave,” Eddie said. “You do remember your way, right?”

  Ben sighed. Why fight it?

  “All right, asshole, turn on the flashlight.”

  The tunnel lit up.

  Ben backed up and took a deep breath. “You better not switch off that light.”

  “What kind of person you think I am?” Eddie asked. “I only want to scare you, not kill you.”

  Ben hesitated. “What?”

  Soft laughter. “You do your best work when you’re scared shitless.”

  He struggled to keep his voice even. “This is all a setup?”

  “The night you were alone in that movie theater—”

  “That was a fluke—”

  “—the time your plane hit all that turbulence.”

  “Another coincidence,” he said. “So this is some kind of elaborate scheme to frighten me into writing music?”

  “I bet it works.”

&nbsp
; Clenching his jaw, Ben broke toward the gap. Sure that Eddie would go against his word, that the light would extinguish at the critical moment, Ben leaped for the other side, felt a vertiginous dread wash over him, and cried out when he tumbled onto the path.

  He came up swinging, but just as his fist whooshed by Eddie’s face, the cave went dark again. Ben stood panting and waiting for the light to come on so he could beat the shit out of his best friend.

  He heard a metallic rattle, a tapping sound.

  “Turn the flashlight on,” Ben said.

  “I’m trying,” Eddie answered. “I dropped it when you freaked out.”

  The darkness of the cave surpassed any Ben had experienced. He remembered hiding in the closet as a kid, huddling under the covers. But even then there had been some light.

  This was like being blind.

  He fought the surge of panic. “Quit screwing around and—”

  “I’m telling you the damn thing’s broken.”

  He heard Eddie tapping on the Maglite.

  “What now?” Ben asked.

  “I don’t know, I guess we feel our way out.”

  “Feel our way out?”

  “What other choice do we have?”

  “You get the flashlight to work, that’s what.”

  “It isn’t, so there’s no use crying over it.”

  Eddie’s voice was receding.

  “Hey,” Ben said and moved forward.

  “What’re you waiting for?” Eddie called, his voice farther yet.

  Ben’s heart hammered. Arms extended, he moved toward Eddie’s voice. At any moment he knew he could plummet toward certain death. Or meet up with Arthur Vaughan, who was supposedly serving five consecutive life sentences but with Ben’s luck had gotten a weekend furlough to relive the good old days in his cannibal home.

  Ben groped forward and swallowed down the acid burning his throat. His stomach was churning, his whole body ached.

  And this was supposed to inspire him.

  He’d kill Eddie, the fucking moron.

  The sweat was trickling down his forehead now, his eyes starting to sting.

  “Eddie?” he said and the ground dropped away beneath him. He cried out, sure he was a goner, but his feet hit the ground and he went tumbling forward, spinning, somersaulting downward without a clue of how to land or how far he’d fallen. Amid the chaos he realized he could see a little and the farther he fell, the more light there was. Then he tumbled out of the cave and landed on his back.

  Ben lay without moving. Distantly, he heard Eddie’s voice uttering some nonsense, asking him if he could move his fingers, count to ten, give him some sign he was still alive.

  Ben was inclined to let him wait.

  A hand was on his shoulder, shaking him. He opened his eyes groggily and saw Eddie’s concerned face gaping down at him. He even detected guilt in Eddie’s eyes.

  “Help me up,” Ben whispered.

  A sharp pain lanced his knee as he put his weight on it. A broken patella maybe. Or a torn ACL. Something pulsed in his mouth, and when he touched it and inspected his fingers they were slick with blood.

  “Jesus,” Eddie said. “That was some fall.”

  Ben stood, swaying on the soft grass, and waited for the dizziness to go away.

  Eddie tapped his forehead with an open hand, said, “Shit, man, I just realized what the problem was.”

  Ben watched in dull rage as Eddie switched the flashlight on.

  “You believe that?” Eddie said, relishing his dumb joke. “And here I thought the batteries had gone dead.”

  Ben punched him in the nose and Eddie went down. Suddenly, Ben felt a lot better.

  Eddie fingered the corner of his mouth, frowned. “I think you knocked a tooth loose.”

  “You deserve worse.”

  Ben eased down beside him and reclined on his elbows. “This wasn’t Arthur Vaughan’s cave, was it.”

  Eddie looked away, a sheepish grin on his face.

  “You just wanted to scare me.”

  “Did you hear anything?”

  “Nothing,” Ben said and winced at the pain from his bloodied knee. “Not a damn thing.”

  Eddie got to his feet and helped him up.

  “I’ve got one more card to play,” Eddie said. “And if it doesn’t work, nothing will.”

  Ben spat, tasted warm copper. “What is it, another cave?”

  Eddie’s face, for the first time that night, lost its sardonic mirth. “If I can arrange it, the place I’m thinking of is the Holy Grail for a guy like you.”

  Ben stared hopelessly down the mountain trail. They were miles from Eddie’s car. From there, it was another two hours to home. If he was lucky, he’d be in bed by dawn.

  “This place you’re talking about,” Ben said, “you ever been there?”

  “No,” Eddie said. “It’s on an island.”

  Chapter Two

  Ben’s ex-wife was waiting for him on the front lawn.

  True, it had only been six months since Jenny’d divided the fabric of his existence with one merciless rip—the divorce papers served to him at the studio, of all places—yet his former home looked strangely unfamiliar, something belonging to another person, another life.

  He stopped the Civic and cut the engine. He could see her peripherally, arms folded, hip jutting to one side, her body language making it plainer than any declaration, “You’re not wanted here.”

  He took a deep breath, pocketed the keys.

  If he wanted to see his son, he would see his son. No court order, no impersonally worded decree would keep him from Joshua.

  She met him on the sidewalk. “I told you not to come.”

  He glanced at the house, hoping he’d catch sight of the boy peering through the window. If Joshua spotted him, he’d be out here in a heartbeat.

  Unless she’d poisoned the child against him, a fear that had been growing ever since their last visit, an awkward question-and-answer session he never imagined could take place with the one person who truly understood him, even if Joshua was still just three.

  “You can’t see him until Friday,” Jenny said.

  “I’ll only stay a minute.”

  She seemed to consider. “On second thought,” she said, “maybe you should see him.”

  Distant alarms went off in his head. “What’s going on?”

  “We’re moving.”

  “That’s all right. I can—”

  “We’re moving back east.”

  Invisible fingers tightened on his throat. Deep down, he’d known this was a possibility, her returning to Indiana to be closer to her parents, but he’d never really thought it would happen.

  “You can’t do that.”

  Her mouth twisted into a hateful grin, the one that made her nostrils flare. “‘In the case of joint custody where guardianship favors the mother—’”

  “Don’t start—”

  “It’s what a judge would say.”

  “A judge who doesn’t know Joshua, who doesn’t realize how much a boy needs his dad—”

  “You’re projecting again, Ben. That’s your mania, not his.”

  “It’s not a mania, dammit. There’s a reason a child has two parents.”

  “Oh Christ,” she said, “here we go with your childhood angst.”

  “It isn’t—”

  “Joshua will be fine. My father will visit—”

  “He needs his father.”

  She paused, mouth opening wide. “You really think he needs you? Have you looked at yourself lately?”

  God damn her, he wanted to grab her face and squeeze. Didn’t she care that she was the one who’d done this to him, who’d put these purple hollows under his eyes?

  He fought to control it. “You never have to see me again, if that’s what you want.”

  “Thank God.”

  The pain in his chest grew, a dull ache spreading to his shoulder.

  “I know that,” he said. “But Joshua’s a different story.”

  “The hell he is.”

  “He needs me.”

  “He has Ryan.”

  At the utterance of the unfamiliar name, the pain in his chest sharpened, bored deeper. All along he’d known there was another man, known Jenny was screwing around, the woman too insecure to throw one relationship away without another waiting in the wings.

  With an effort, he said, “Whoever Ryan is, he isn’t Joshua’s dad.”

  “Not yet.”

  Ben stared at her.