In the Dark of the Night

But the little girl Eric was seeing wasn’t her little sister at all, and her name wasn’t Emma.

Her name was Marci.

And she was his own little sister.

“Kill them,” Lizzie Borden’s voice implored. “Kill them now!”

MERRILL BREWSTER SLIPPED her arm around her daughter’s shoulders and drew her close as they gazed up at the spectacle in the sky. As the fireworks built toward their finale, she tried to remember ever having a more perfect Fourth of July, but even as the question formed in her mind, she knew the answer.

Never.

The day had been perfect, and she finally understood that Dan had been right — whatever had happened to Ellis Langstrom had nothing to do with her or her family, and for once she hadn’t let her fears ruin the summer for everyone.

As if reading her thoughts, Marci grinned up at her. “Now aren’t you happy we didn’t go home yesterday?” she asked.

Merrill smiled down at Marci, who was still dressed in her costume as the Statue of Liberty. “Very happy. Happier than you’ll ever know.”

“

KILL THEM!” LIZZIE commanded. “Kill them now!”

Logan lumbered toward the family that was still a dozen paces away, the steady stream of flashes from the sky lighting his way, the slashing axe, which was flickering as if lit by a strobe.

“Thirty-three. Thirty-four.”

ERIC CHARGED PAST the screaming, bleeding people whose cries were all but ignored by the mob whose attention was still focused on the spectacle in the sky.

“No!” he howled as Logan moved closer to his family, the axe rising high above Marci’s head while inside his own head Lizzie Borden’s voice screamed for more blood.

More death.

Ahead of him — just out of his reach — the rag-clad man stood poised with Lizzie Borden’s axe over his head, and in another moment—

A surge of panic triggered something deep inside Eric, and then he was leaping forward, his arms outstretched, the single word he’d uttered before now erupting from his throat with enough force to rise above the volley of fireworks that were pouring into the night sky as the finale began.

“NOOOOO!”

With an unnatural strength that came out of nowhere, Eric seized Logan’s arm and whipped him around.

Logan’s eyes — dead black orbs — fixed on him.

“Kill him!” Eric heard the voice command, and this time knew it was his own death she was demanding.

Jerking free from Eric’s grip, Logan raised the axe again.

But then he hesitated, and a faint glimmer flashed in his eyes.

“Kill him!” the voice screamed.

Now Kent and Tad appeared out of the crowd, hurling themselves on Logan, trying to bring him down, but the old man held his stance as if braced by some unseen force.

Eric grabbed at the axe handle — slippery with blood — and wrenched it free from Logan’s grip.

The voice howled: “Yes! Yes! You do it! I killed my family. Now it’s your turn!”

Eric’s eyes flicked toward Marci, who had finally turned away from the glory in the sky and now beheld the horror all around her. Her face paled and her mouth opened wide, but no sound came out.

Eric tore his eyes away from his little sister to look once more at Logan.

Their eyes met.

And their gazes held.

And in that moment when their eyes held each other’s, Eric understood everything.

Logan, his eyes finally coming back to life, nodded.

Tightening his grip on the axe, Eric raised it, then brought it down, sinking it deep into the old man’s shoulder.

Logan staggered, but held his stance, and as blood began to gush from his shoulder, he spoke.

Spoke so softly only Eric could hear.

“Thirty-eight.”

Time seemed to stand still, and once more the eyes of the boy met those of the man.

Once again, the man nodded.

As the voice inside his head screamed out against him, Eric raised the axe a second time, and plunged it deep into Logan’s gut.

Again the old man staggered, and this time he sank to the ground.

“Thirty-nine,” he whispered, as Kent and Tad fell on him, pinning him to the spot where he lay.

Eric was trembling now, and as he stood over the fallen man, he felt a terrible cold enter his body. The voice of the woman was still screaming, but the other voices were starting to fade away. And the man on the ground — the man he’d already struck twice with the axe, was staring up at him.

For the third time their eyes met.

For the third time, the man spoke. “Do it,” he whispered. “End it.”

As Kent and Tad held him down, Eric raised the axe a final time, then brought it down, its head swinging in a great arc before slicing though the old man’s neck to sink deep into the ground beneath the blood-soaked lawn.

“No!” the last, lone voice sighed inside Eric’s head. Then it fell silent, and Eric stared down at the severed head. The features were almost invisible behind the blood-matted beard, but as the fireworks above began to fade away, Eric was certain he saw the lips move.

“Forty.”

The single word echoed in Eric’s mind, but then, as the last glowing embers fell from the sky, silence finally fell over him, too.

The voices vanished.

Then, very slowly, the sounds of reality returned.

All around him, Eric heard people howling and screaming, but this time it wasn’t because of the fireworks from above.

Now it was because of the horror they were discovering all around them.

But inside, all was still quiet.

No more voices shouted in his head.

He looked down at his hands, still clinging to the bloody axe.

His legs began to tremble.

He took one stumbling step toward Tad and Kent, but his legs wouldn’t work, and he sank to the ground, every ounce of his strength drained away, every scrap of energy gone.

He barely felt the quilt his mother wrapped around his shoulders, barely noticed as someone took the axe from his hands.

“It’s okay,” he heard someone say as he took a ragged breath and struggled against the terrible exhaustion that held him in its grip. “You did the right thing. He would’ve killed us all.”

The night began to close around him, and for a moment Eric continued to struggle against the gathering darkness, but then he gave in and let himself fall into the embrace of sleep.

Tonight, no bad dreams would come.

Epilogue