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  Praise For Daemon of the Dark Wood

  “No doubt, this novel is a ‘creature-feature’ page-turner in the finest tradition, but as with all of Chandler’s writing, read a little deeper and you find an austere, knowing treatise on the human condition. Chandler’s examination of character is outstanding as well; the widow Leatherwood and hillside wanderer Edgar are both particularly well-drawn. You not only get into their heads, but Chandler makes you wear their skins and feel their heartache, loneliness and sheer dread and terror.”

  —Walt Hicks, Hellbound Times

  “Daemon of the Dark Wood starts off with the comfortable feel of an 80’s horror novel. You have the rural setting, well-drawn characters, and an ancient evil coming forth. It starts off at a leisurely pace, and gradually builds to a frenzy. Chandler offers up wild situations and images that bring to mind Bentley Little. Or maybe even Edward Lee.”

  —Mark Sieber, Horror Drive-In

  “Prepare to have your world rocked! Randy Chandler delivers the goods once again with Daemon of the Dark Wood. Horror fans need this!”

  —David T. Wilbanks, co-author of the Dead Earth books

  “The legend of Widow’s Ridge should be entirely believable to anyone familiar with American folklore and folk music, as those stories and songs are replete with betrayal, death, murder, grief—most all of the negative aspects of human life, in fact. Daemon of the Dark Wood will please any reader who relishes a well-written tale of ancient knowledge and hidden dangers, and those who fight to keep the human realm free of unbridled evil.”

  —J.G. Stinson, ForeWord Reviews Magazine

  A Comet Press Book

  Comet Press Electronic Edition February 2012

  Daemon of the Dark Wood copyright © 2012 by Randy Chandler

  All Rights Reserved.

  Cover painting copyright © 2012 by Daniele Serra

  This book is a work of fiction. People, places, events, and situations are the product of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

  No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system, without the written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

  Trade Paperback ISBN 13: 978-1-936964-46-8

  Visit Comet Press on the web at: www.cometpress.us

  Table of Contents

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  About the Author

  Other books by Randy Chandler

  About Comet Press

  For the Stimson girls and the women they became

  Chapter One

  * * *

  The last thing her lover said to her was “Watch out for the deer,” but those words of warning vanished in the lingering afterglow of their lovemaking, and by the time she turned onto the road to Widow’s Ridge, Judy Lynn Bowen’s thoughts were on their upcoming wedding. In three weeks she would become Mrs. Joshua Lee Jordan, and her life would change from the roots up.

  “Judy Lynn Jordan,” she said aloud, and not for the first time. The name was a perfect fit for her, and she took it as a sign that their marriage would be nothing short of conjugal bliss.

  The evening shadows deepened to dusk, and Judy Lynn switched on her headlights. The winding blacktop took her up the forested mountain, her home in Widow’s Ridge a welcoming destination at the end of a busy day. With one hand on the wheel, she dug her pack of Virginia Slims out of her purse, shook one out and placed it between her lips. She punched in the dash lighter and waited for it to pop out with its coils hot enough to fire her cigarette. She inhaled deeply, savoring the rich smoke and wondering if she could keep her promise to Josh that she would quit smoking whenever they decided it was time to make a baby. She exhaled, confident that she could kick the habit when the time came.

  The creature came out of the dark trees and bounded into the hazy shafts of her headlights. Before her foot reached the brake pedal, the deer slammed into the front end of her car and a smothering blackness hit her full in the face, smashing her cigarette, momentarily disorienting her. The air bag was already deflated before she realized it had deployed from the steering wheel, and the car lurched to a stop in a shallow roadside ditch on the left side of the road.

  The engine died. She stared in dazed wonder at the blood-tinted spiderwebbed fissures in the windshield and at the single beam of the remaining headlight that illuminated the ditch and the trees beyond the shoulder of the road. She touched her fingers to her face, relieved to find no blood of her own. I’m all right. Just a little twist of pain in my neck.

  The deer. Where was the poor creature? After the impact with the front-end, it must have bounced off the windshield and fallen to the road. It became imperative to find the deer and see how badly it was hurt. Judy Lynn opened the car door and tried to get out, but something held her fast.

  The seatbelt, stupid.

  She pushed the release button and the seatbelt retracted, grudgingly letting her go. She stepped carefully from the car and into the ditch. She moved quickly around the rear of the car to the road, her eyes searching the dusk for the injured animal.

  “Oh God,” she said when her eyes found the dark shape stretched out in the center of the road. She took a step toward it, then halted when she remembered the flashlight in the Honda’s glove box; she spun on her heels and went back for the Mag-Lite. Leaning across the front seat, she thought to turn off the remaining headlight and turn on the hazard lights.

  She congratulated herself for such clarity of thought so soon after the shock of collision, and then steeled herself for an assessment of the deer’s injuries, dreading what she would probably be forced to do. She took a deep breath, clicked on the flashlight and walked quickly toward the four-legged casualty in the middle of the two-lane blacktop.

  The doe was alive but grievously injured. The bone of the right foreleg protruded obscenely through blood-matted fur, and blood bubbled from the snout and leaked from the corner of its mouth. The doe’s brown eyes were big with fear, or so they appeared to Judy Lynn when she shined the flashlight at them. The animal tried to lift its head from the road, then convulsed, hind legs thrashing as if trying to run to the safety of the surrounding woods. “God, I’m so sorry,” she said, sobbing. The animal convulsed again, harder this time. Judy Lynn wished she had a gun so she could end the doe’s suffering. A tire iron. I could hit it in the head with a tire iron and put it out of its misery. Without giving herself time for second thoughts,
she hurried back to the Honda, popped the trunk and dug out the tire iron. With the flashlight in one hand and the tire iron in the other, she stood over the dying deer and told herself she had to do it. She had to put an end to the creature’s suffering.

  It was the only humane option she had.

  She set the flashlight down on the road with its beam aimed at the doe’s head, then gripped the cool iron in both hands. “I’m sorry,” she whispered, raising the instrument of cold mercy high over her right shoulder.

  She was still frozen in that position when the headlights from an approaching vehicle bathed her backside in harsh light, her long shadow stretching out in front of her like some creature of nightmare. As the pickup rumbled to a stop behind her, she lowered the tire iron and turned toward the truck.

  “Damn, Judy Lynn,” said the driver, “you aim to change a flat on that critter?”

  “Billy Ray?”

  Billy Ray Threadgill jumped out of his mud-spattered pickup and squatted beside the fallen deer. “She’s a goner. You okay?”

  “You got a gun in your truck?” she asked him.

  A smile twisted up the corners of his droopy blond mustache. “Does a possum shit in the woods? Hell yes, I got a gun.”

  “Get it,” she said, staring into the animal’s eyes. “Hurry.”

  He went to his pickup and came back with a pistol dangling from his hand. “Vaya con dios, Bambi,” he said, then raised the gun and shot the doe in the head. The animal twitched once, then was still.

  Judy Lynn sighed heavily with relief—and regret. Billy Ray stuck the pistol in the waist of his jeans, grabbed the hind legs of the deer and dragged it to the rear of his Ford F-150. “Help me get her into the truck,” he said. “Lotta good meat on this here roadkill.”

  She didn’t want to touch the dead creature, but neither did she want to leave it to rot on the roadside, so she bent to the task, and a minute later the doe was in the bed of the truck, and Billy Ray was wiping his bloody hands on his faded jeans. “I’ll bring you some of the meat after I get her dressed.”

  “No thanks,” she said with a shudder.

  He turned his attention to her damaged Civic. Using her flashlight, he examined the front end of the vehicle. “Damn lucky you ain’t hurt bad,” he told her. “Little car like this going up against a deer …” He shook his head. “Ain’t drivable. Come on, I’ll take you to Grubb’s and he can send his wrecker.”

  “I’ll use my cell phone,” she said. “It’ll be quicker.”

  “Want me to take you home?” His face was bronzed from his construction work under the Georgia sun, and in the flashing red haze of the Honda’s hazard lights his smile became a sinister leer.

  “No. I should stay with my car.”

  Billy Ray shrugged. “Suit yourself. Ain’t like nobody’s gonna steal it.”

  “Thanks for your help, Billy Ray.”

  “Any time, darlin’.” He climbed into his pickup, gunned the engine and drove off, waggling his fingers in farewell.

  Judy Lynn sat behind the wheel of the Civic and used her cell phone to call Grubb’s Service Station in Dogwood. Jerry Grubb answered and said he’d send his son out with the wrecker. She thanked him, hit the END button, lit a much needed cigarette, and settled deeper into the bucket seat to wait for the wrecker. She turned on the car radio for company but turned it off when all she could find amid the shrill static was a radio preacher ranting about the End Times of the New Millennium.

  She would’ve called Josh to tell him what happened—that in spite of his warning she had hit a deer—but she knew he was having his customary pre-prayer meeting supper with his folks and that Reverend Jordan always took the phone off the hook before the family sat down for the blessing and a big meal of greasy vegetables and overcooked meat. She smoked her cigarette and listened to the steady chorus of insects, embellished by the occasional cry of a night bird and the hoo-hoo-hoo of an owl.

  She didn’t like being alone on this road at night, stuck in a ditch and cut off from civilization. Unnerved, she opened her phone and stared at the little illuminated window. She considered calling her mother to tell her what had happened, but then she remembered that this was her mother’s bridge night at Sally Jensen’s and she didn’t know Sally’s number. The police, she remembered. She should call the police to report the accident for insurance purposes. Without an accident report on file, the insurance company probably wouldn’t pay.

  All at once the cicadas stopped singing and the woods went completely silent. Judy Lynn stiffened in her seat, tingling with a sense of intense foreboding at the sudden change in the evening’s ambience. Her ears popped as if there had been a fluctuation in atmospheric pressure. Saliva surged around her tongue with a metallic taste of inexplicable fear.

  Something came crashing through the underbrush to her left.

  Something big.

  Before she could move to roll up the window and lock the door, the eerie silence of the woods shattered, broken by a terrible screeching that seemed to go on forever. It was unlike any sound she had ever heard, and she suddenly had the crazy idea that it was neither animal nor human in origin.

  Judy Lynn began to tremble. She lost control of her bladder, and warm urine pooled in her panties and leaked onto the car seat. The cell phone slipped from her hand. The darkness deepened.

  The screeching finally subsided, and the terror it had engendered within her became something altogether different. Overcome with absolute awe, she removed herself from the wrecked vehicle and walked fearlessly into the woods to meet the one who had called to her.

  * * * *

  Arcadia County Deputy Sheriff Rob Rourke was hunkered over a pile of paperwork when the phone rang with an old-timey jangle. Ida Mae Harris was still in the bathroom, so Rourke got up, strode to the dispatcher’s desk and snatched up the receiver. “Sheriff’s office, Rourke.”

  “Hey, Rob, how you doing?”

  He recognized Jerry Grubb’s smoky voice. “Just fine, Jerry. What can I do for you?”

  “Did Judy Lynn Bowen call y’all about that deer she hit up on Widow’s Ridge Road?”

  “No, she didn’t. She okay?”

  “She was all right when I talked to her. Just shook up a little. I sent my boy up with the wrecker after she called, but when Jack got there, she was gone. Her car was half in a ditch but there weren’t hide nor hair of the girl. Didn’t see no deer neither. Just a puddle of blood in the road.”

  “She probably got a ride with somebody before Jack got there. And the deer’s probably dead or dying somewhere in the woods.”

  “Maybe. But why would she leave her pocketbook and cell phone in the car?”

  After a thoughtful pause, Rourke said, “I’ll look into it. Exactly where was this?”

  “Jack said it was about a mile and a half up the mountain from Jackson’s General Store.”

  “Where’s her car now?”

  “We got it here. Front end’s all tore up and the windshield’s cracked. Them little Honda’s buckle like tin cans when they hit something solid. I wouldn’t have no little foreign car myself.”

  Rourke ran a hand over his close-cropped hair and said, “Here’s what I want you to do, Jerry. Put the car in your bay and lock it down. Don’t touch anything any more than you have to. Is her purse still in the car?”

  “Yep. I was fixin’ to put it in my safe.”

  “No, leave it where it is. And don’t say anything to anybody else about this. We don’t know that she’s missing and I don’t want to start tongues wagging.”

  As he dropped the phone in its cradle, Ida Mae returned from the bathroom down the hall. She cut a fine figure in her tailored khaki uniform—especially for a woman in her mid-forties. “I miss anything?” she asked.

  He told her about the call, then asked her to phone Miss Bowen’s home in Widow’s Ridge and to try her parents’ home if there was no answer. While she worked the phone, Rourke poured himself a mug of aging coffee and went back to his desk to
mull over the possible whereabouts of Judy Lynn Bowen.

  A few minutes later, Ida Mae informed him that there was no answer at Judy Lynn’s home and that Mrs. Bowen had just returned from a friend’s house and hadn’t seen her daughter since yesterday. “I didn’t let on that anything was wrong,” Ida explained. “I just told her I needed to talk to Judy Lynn about the wedding. She’s marrying Josh Jordan, you know.”

  Rourke nodded. He tossed down his pen, stood and grabbed his hat from a hook on the pine-paneled wall. “I’m gonna take a ride up the mountain,” he said. “I’ll keep you posted.”

  His boot heels tapped a snappy rhythm on the hardwood floor and echoed in the empty hallway as he headed toward the rear door leading outside to the designated parking area for sheriff’s department cruisers. Boots were not officially part of the uniform, but Sheriff Gladstone always sported cowboy boots, and most of his deputies were happy to follow his example. The boots went with the western-style white hats. Good-guy hats.

  The sheriff’s office was housed on the first floor of the courthouse building, one door down from the office of the District Attorney. The county jail was located just off Dogwood’s town square, on Confederate Avenue. Because Arcadia was the smallest county in North Georgia, its law enforcement arm was short rather than long; in fact, it was the smallest sheriff’s department in the entire state. And that suited Rob Rourke just fine. There was less bureaucratic aggravation in a smaller governmental organization.

  He left the air-conditioned interior of the old courthouse, and the fresh air of the fine June night washed over him like a soothing balm. To his way of thinking, artificially conditioned air was one of many modern conveniences he had rather do without. His own modest home was cooled by an attic fan because a fan didn’t suck the moisture from the air and leave him feeling mummified the way central air-conditioning did.

  Rourke took his hat off as he slid behind the wheel of Unit 3 and set it on the passenger seat. He checked the gas gauge, cranked up and pulled out of the parking lot. He drove across town, by-passed Dogwood Community College and turned onto Widow’s Ridge Road. The cruiser smelled faintly of cheap aftershave, stale tobacco smoke and greasy fast food. He fingered the buttons on the driver’s door armrest and let all the windows down, the welcome rush of night air blowing away the lingering scents—the territorial markings—of his fellow deputies.