Sleepy Hollow: Bridge of Bones Read online

  Jason caught Charley by the collar. He was livid. “If you ever hit my dog again—”

  “What? You’ll do what?”

  “I’ll—I’ll out you to your father.”

  Jason regretted the words instantly. He’d made a nuclear threat. Only two people knew Zef’s secret, Jason and his best friend Joey, and only because Zef had made a pass at each of them. (Joey had enjoyed it. Jason most definitely had not.) This secret was the biggest trump card he had against Zef. But it wasn’t Jason’s secret to tell. He’d promised himself he would never stoop that low. But he’d wanted to see the look on Zef’s face.

  Zef froze. Terror lit his eyes. The punctured Heineken can pin wheeled between them, hissing as it died.

  “Hey. Don’t worry,” Jason said, backtracking. “I didn’t mean it. I—”

  Zef scrambled blindly for the nearest object. He found Eliza’s apple-shaped cookie jar. Jason realized with a jolt that it would hold memories, not cookies. More memories, maybe, than anything else in the house. Her best advice. Or their happiest day. He could use his Gift, reach inside and pull a vision from the past. He could see Eliza, even talk to her again…

  Zef raised the jar one-handed, like a flaming pumpkin, and hurled it at Jason’s head. Jason’s hands flew up instinctively, attempting to pluck the apple from the air and gather it to his heart, but he fumbled it and…

  …it shattered across the tile.

  Zef’s mouth hung open. “I didn’t mean to do that.”

  Jason lunged. His left hand seized Zef’s shirt and pulled, ripping it across the shoulder. Zef knocked Jason’s head back. Jason elbowed Zef in the teeth. They careened against the cabinets, crunching over the remains of the cookie jar, throwing wild punches. They crashed into the breakfast table. The overhead fixture swayed. Charley yipped and jumped aside. The boys fell together over a chair and continued the fight on the floor. Jason made a fist, pulled it back, and aimed for Zef’s nose.

  A deluge of freezing, soapy water fell from above. They pulled apart, twisting on the floor, gasping in shock. Hadewych stood over them with a now-empty bucket.

  “Enough,” Hadewych said.

  Jason reddened. He sat up, ready to kill both Van Brunts. Hadewych put a knee on Jason’s chest and pinned his wrists.

  “Who started it?” demanded Hadewych.

  “Jason,” said Zef.

  “Zef,” said Jason, struggling to escape.

  Hadewych rolled his eyes. “Who threw the first punch?”

  “Zef. He hit my dog.”

  “I barely pushed it. The thing bit me!”

  “And he wrecked—he wrecked—” Jason tore an arm free and flailed in the direction of the shattered cookie jar.

  “It was an accident,” said Zef. “God! It’s just a cheap dime-store—”

  “It was hers!”

  “Get up,” said Hadewych.

  He released Jason, stood, and offered a hand. Jason knocked it away. He pulled himself up and brushed mop water from his eyes. He would not cry.

  Hadewych snapped his fingers. “Zef, get a broom.”

  “I’ll do that,” said Jason. He didn’t want Zef touching any of Eliza’s possessions, not even their smashed bits.

  “No,” said Hadewych. “You will buy Zef a new shirt. And Zef will buy you a new… cookie jar.” His voice dripped with derision.

  “I don’t want a new—”

  “Ugh,” said Hadewych, making a disgusted face. “You’re so sentimental. Stop whining like a little pansy.”

  Jason looked over Hadewych’s shoulder. Zef winced and turned his face away. Charley yipped. Hadewych had picked her up by the collar. Her feet bicycled the air frantically.

  “Put her down!” cried Jason.

  “She can’t control herself. And until she learns—” Hadewych opened the back door. Cold air rushed into the house, searing Jason’s wet skin. “—she can live outside.”

  “You can’t!”

  Jason and Zef followed Hadewych out the back door, down the thirteen steps and into the yard.

  “Shit on the stairs!” Hadewych grumbled. “Puddles in the kitchen! Barking and biting and scratching! How long did you think I would put up with it? It’s unsanitary and now it’s making my boys fight.”

  The frozen grass needled Jason’s feet. “It’s too cold!”

  “She’s an animal. With fur. Zef, find me something to tie her up with.”

  “Come on, Dad. It is cold.”

  “Don’t—” shouted Hadewych, raising a finger. His voice dropped to a whisper. “Don’t make me wake the neighbors.”

  Zef climbed the stairs and disappeared into the house.

  “If you do this,” said Jason, “I’ll just bring her inside again.”

  Charley clawed the earth. Hadewych knelt and stroked her back. He gave a big toothpaste-commercial smile.

  “Then we’ll have to find a new family for her.”

  “You wouldn’t.”

  “We can’t have her ruining our home. I could put out an ad.”

  “No.”

  “You’re sure?” He tightened his grip on the nape of her neck. The dog whined and struggled, hurting.

  “Yeah. I’m sure.”

  “Very sensible.” Hadewych allowed Jason to take Charley’s collar. Zef appeared at the back door long enough to throw down a ball of twine. Hadewych caught it and offered it to Jason. “Pick a tree.”

  “No. She can live in there.” Jason cocked his thumb towards the detached garage. “It’ll be warmer.”

  “Perfect.”

  Hadewych opened the side door of the garage. Charley darted across the threshold and turned circles next to the parked RV, looking confused. Hadewych held the dog at bay with one foot and swung the door shut in her face. She howled and Jason’s heart broke.

  “Let’s not fuss,” said Hadewych. He patted Jason’s shoulder. “She’ll be fine. This is a fair compromise. Give and take. Can’t you try to act like part of the family?”

  They met Zef coming down the back stairs. He was toweling his hair and carried a trash bag. Jason snatched the bag from Zef’s hand and opened it. It contained the crumbs of the cookie jar.

  Hadewych stepped between them. “Bed for both of you. Come inside.”

  Jason shook his head and squared his shoulders. “No. If Charley sleeps in the garage, so do I.”

  Hadewych gathered his robe and cinched it. “Really.”

  “In the RV. All winter if I have to.”

  Hadewych smiled and shrugged. “Suit yourself. It won’t change my mind. You’ll come back inside soon enough. When your ass starts to freeze.”

  “Don’t bet on it.”

  Hadewych ascended the stairs. He stopped at the landing. The porch light blazed behind his head. He was the warden in his guard tower. Executor of the estate and, Jason knew in his heart, executioner of his grandmother.

  “You ought to be ashamed, Jason. Choosing possessions and pets over people who care about you. Family comes first. Look to Family. That’s the Van Brunt motto. You’re an honorary Van Brunt now. Act like it.” He sighed and wagged a finger. “Think about what you’ve done, young man.”

  CHAPTER TWO

  “The Bar of Gold”

  The back door clapped shut behind Hadewych.

  Zef stood on the stairs, halfway up, looking sheepish. “Don’t say anything,” he said and raised a palm. “He’s my father.”

  “I know what he is. Do you?” Jason pointed to the place at the foot of the back stairs where he’d discovered Eliza. “He killed her, you know.”

  “Stop saying that. She slipped and fell.”

  “She did not just fall.”

  “My dad was with me that whole night. We had a pizza and watched Frankenstein!”

  Jason knew Hadewych had an alibi. Of course the man did. But Hadewych hadn’t killed Eliza with his own hands, no. He’d used the Horseman’s Treasure. He had manipulated them all—Jason, Eliza, even his own lover Valerie—into that insane Project. Jason
had agreed to open the Van Brunt tomb but Hadewych had secretly swiped the Treasure for himself, whatever it was. He’d used its magic to summon the Horseman and kill Eliza… So, no, Jason couldn’t prove that Hadewych was responsible for Eliza’s death but he knew. He could feel it in his gut. Like the hatchet in the Nightmare, hacking his belly, going deep, pushing pain and blood and nausea into his throat.

  “Why would he even do that?” said Zef.

  “Isn’t it obvious?” Jason shook his head. “He wanted her money. He wanted our house. And now he’s got them.”

  Zef raised his voice. “Come on. My dad can be an asshole but he’s not a monster.”

  Jason matched his volume. “He is a monster.”

  “I say he’s a good man.”

  “And I say he’s a murderer.”

  “Well, one of us is wrong.”

  “Yeah. One of us is.”

  Zef turned and climbed the stairs. Jason shot the finger at his back. Eliza had certainly picked a winner when she’d gone looking for Jason’s long-lost relatives. Joseph “Zef” Van Brunt—Jason’s third cousin on his mother’s side and his only family left in the world—was a total freaking jackass.

  Zef gained the top of the stairs, reached through the door, and turned the porch light off. “I’m sorry.”

  “For what?”

  Jason counted four white breaths.

  “All of it. I—I shouldn’t drink so much.” Zef turned, a little unsteadily, and slipped into the house.

  “Yeah, well,” Jason muttered to himself, “if I had your father I’d drink too.”

  He turned away and limped back to the garage, favoring his ankle. He toggled a light switch but the overhead fluorescents had burned out. Did he really intend to live here? Great. He’d lost his upstairs room, now Eliza’s room, hell, the whole damn house. At this rate he’d be living in Oregon by the end of the month. He took a step and spider web shrouded his face. He batted it away, instantly transformed into the Karate Kid.

  Charley greeted him happily. He knelt and scratched her head.

  “Here’s another fine mess you’ve gotten me into.”

  He fetched a key ring from the glove compartment of the RV and unlocked the rear camper. He gathered the trash bag and dog and carried them both inside. He thumbed a switch and the lights flickered to life, hesitantly, like moths waking from ether. The space had two bunks one above the other, a leatherette couch, a shower stall, a mini fridge, and a propane stove. He and Eliza had lived here for weeks on their grave-hunting trip. It felt like coming home.

  Charley spun circles in her excitement, leaping with joy as if seeing… what? Jason felt something too. Something invisible. He couldn’t put his finger on it.

  “Eliza?” Jason whispered. “Are you in here?”

  The calendar on the wall read SEPTEMBER. It showed cartoon children carrying schoolbooks and a grinning worm emerging from an apple. The red box of a Scrabble set poked from beneath the bottom bunk. A blizzard of magnetic poetry swept across the mini fridge. Eliza had enjoyed making up doggerel with these, little ransom notes in haiku. Jason knelt and read them:

  MY PEN IS LIFE AND LOVE MY INK

  RED MEAT YOU RUN MAD LY WITH SCISSOR S

  SHADOW STAR S AND MOON S ACHING LY JUMBLED.

  GOOD MEAL S MAKE GOOD DREAM S

  He smiled. Eliza was here, in the sight of these familiar things. That was all. There’s no such thing as a haunted RV. The poodle was happy to be away from the house, away from whatever had been spooking her. Jason dropped the trash bag next to the bed and lay with Charley in the bottom bunk. The poodle lolled about, relaxed and docile. She licked Jason’s face and offered her belly to be scratched.

  He slid aside a hidden panel next to the bed, slipped the ring of keys into the compartment and—

  He sat bolt upright, hitting his head on the upper bunk.

  Where was the gold?

  He’d hidden a bar of gold in the glove compartment. Before Halloween. A kilo bar worth tens of thousands of dollars. He’d meant it to be his getaway money. Revulsion and anger shot through him. Hadewych had found the gold and taken it. That son of a bitch. That shady son of a bitch. Jason cursed himself. How could he have been so stupid? He could never prove the theft and now half of his secret gold stash was gone. Hopefully his other kilo bar still lay buried beneath the roots of the persimmon tree in the side yard. Damn it. Hadewych would rob the estate blind.

  He kicked the wall. His good mood had shattered like the cookie jar. He dropped back onto the bunk. All his problems rolled around in his head. The Horseman, Hadewych, the ghost living in the attic. He didn’t know where to begin.

  He noticed a book at his elbow.

  GATEWOOD GUIDE TO

  GENEALOGICAL RESEARCH

  He smiled. Eliza’s bedtime reading.

  On impulse, he pressed his palm to the cover of the book, closing his eyes. “Show her to me,” he whispered. He rubbed the book with his thumb… the glossy paper, the dog-eared corners… He forced himself to relax. He counted backwards. Ten… Nine… Eight… His breathing grew shallow…

  …and he fell like a pebble through the skin of time.

  “Found the sucker!” cried Eliza.

  The sun flared above. Eliza pushed aside the rusted gate of an abandoned cemetery. She wore a yellow blouse and sunglasses perched in her grey bird’s-nest of hair. She had the Gatewood Guide tucked under one arm. Jason appeared at her elbow. He passed through the gate, offered his hand, and helped her into the weed-infested plot. Seven crooked headstones poked out of the underbrush. White-berried bushes choked the graves at back. A stone fence surrounded it all, roughly mortared and crude.

  “Look at these beautiful grave symbols!” Eliza gushed, pushing the weeds aside. “Pop quiz, Honey. What symbol is that?”

  Jason peered down at the grey stone. “That’s a… scythe?”

  “Bingo. Meaning?”

  “Um…”

  “The reaping of life. What about this thistle?”

  “Sorrow?”

  “Exactly. Sorrow over the loss. Good job, Boy-o.”

  They wandered the graves. Eliza squinted at the epitaphs with weary eyes. Cataracts had begun to steal her vision. She was eighty and, if this was their September grave-hunting trip, she would be murdered by Hadewych in less than a month.

  “Gotcha!” Eliza shouted, patting the top of a headstone. This grave was especially weedy and the ground had fallen in a little. “Over here, Son. Hand me my paper.”

  Jason produced a cardboard roll and fetched out a piece of onionskin paper. Eliza tried to press it flush against the stone but lost control of it. Jason caught it before it could escape.

  “I’ve dropped the charcoal, too,” she said, flexing her hands and sounding helpless. “Forgot to take my dang pills this morning. You’d better do the rubbings from here on out.”

  Jason knelt, pressed the paper to the headstone, and fanned the charcoal back and forth. “Like this?”

  “Bear down. Put your elbows into it.”

  Jason worked at bringing the epitaph out of the stone. Eliza stepped away, looking at the view—autumn just catching fire. New England at its most beautiful.

  “Are you enjoying our trip, Honey?”

  “Sure,” said Jason, looking glum.

  “I know. Genealogy’s not your thing. I don’t blame you. It’s morbid. It’s looking backwards. Young people look to the future. That’s how it should be.” Her face clouded over. “Look at this old place. These people worked and struggled and we don’t even pull their weeds. You have to pull the weeds to know your roots. You may not like what you find, though—every family has bad apples—but even then you learn from their mistakes. The answers to most problems can be found in the past.” She sighed. “I sound like an old lady. Blah. When I’m gone, promise to pull the weeds, okay?”

  “Sure,” he said.

  “Promise.” Her voice was stern.

  Jason looked up, saw that she was serious, and nodded. �
��I promise.”

  “You’re such a good boy.” She grinned. The cloud had passed over. “How we doing?”

  “Just about done.”

  “Let’s see.”

  Jason held up the rubbing:

  William Crane

  Soldier

  Died 1792

  “Good one!” she said. “Try to press a little harder next time.”

  Jason rolled the paper and slid it back into the tube

  Eliza took his arm. “Help me back down, Honey. My hip is howling and I need to drain my radiator.” They paused at the cemetery gate. She glanced back, her face solemn. She kissed a stiff arthritic hand and gave a little wave. “Sleep well, everybody…” They pulled the rusted gate shut. She leaned on her grandson’s arm and they walked away together, down the leaf-strewn hill.

  The vision broke. Jason pulled his palm away from the book and wiped his eyes. He stared at the Gatewood Guide for a long time, thinking of her. He remembered that day, so recent yet… a lifetime ago. Why had he been given that vision in particular? How did his Gift choose what to show him? Did every vision contain meaning? He wondered if unseen presences were guiding him. He’d never entertained such notions before.

  He considered Eliza’s words. She was right. The answers to his problems lay in the past, in the Horseman’s Treasure, its origins and powers, in the ugly history of the Van Brunt family. Pull the weeds to know the roots. He had to reach into the past—that’s what his Gift was for, after all—if he had any hope of surviving the present.

  He rolled onto his side and stroked Charley’s fur. The trash bag lay on the floor nearby. He opened it and ran his palm over the shards of the cookie jar, hoping to get another vision, but—