2026 Week 1: 11,178 words
/This includes all planning notes, both used and unused at the end, but maybe spoilers.
Prologue - Scene 1
When they killed William, it wasn’t the hunger or the cold. They were just tired of all the complaining about Hastings.
Yes, the Cutoff added 125 miles to the journey. Yes, it took them to the foot of the Sierra Nevada right before November which was supposed to be clear for another few weeks, though in truth, family, they never should’ve trusted the locals. And yes, maybe it should have been Hastings instead, but the little tin-pot dictator had cachet; a dream of his own Californian empire, and maybe most importantly, Hastings had the training to work a rifle.
Silas wasn’t the first grave. He wouldn’t be the last. Whether this was fortunate or not depended on who you asked and how much peace they’d made with the Gods.
Hastings was out now. On a dual purpose excursion into the blizzard. One, find the way out of the mountain pass he’d written about, and two, find something to fill their bellies.
I suppose there was a third purpose, too, for one. Dok Danathorne Neeka. It ain’t good for a man to stew inside on a bright day, but it’s even worse to feel so useless on the worst week of his life. So some of the womenfolk thought it might give him some purpose to go out on the expedition. The menfolk agreed. And they were right to send him away.
The cave was cold. At the front, the wind was like a whistle but deep in the cave, those same gusts turned to moans, groans, the haunting banshee shriek, and most nights it frightened the youngest in the party, but that wailing went silent before the tribunal.
Enoch Carver sat upon some rock he’d found. Many did not want to grant him even that but no one was fool enough to stop him after... well you’ll see. Some described the man’s eyes as recessed within caves of their own while others said the brown had turned black, but now those eyes gazed into a bowl of stew. A stringy piece of meat floated next to a carrot coin.
On the other side of the fire, a cauldron of that same simmering stew that brought them all here, sat three men and one lady, Edith, the sternest of the three, as pious as she was old. A crime like this needed a stern, pious mother of mothers. Maybe they all do.
The folks, the jury if you please, had backed against the wall. Despite the fire, the cave had an unearthly chill befitting the bleak December afternoon where no light shone through, but if those bone-thin folks would’ve scooched just a hair closer to the council, they might’ve warmed their faces, though I understand why they stayed away. Before you go thinking the stew might’ve warmed their bellies, too, and the bowls their hands, wait a spell.
I know it smelled delicious.
Whatever was in it, hunger is the spice of all spice to make something nice. And with their livestock shot, lost, or long since digested, folks were hungry enough even for that... that stew of Carver’s.
With light so scarce, you wouldn’t blame a person for sleeping even just past noon. That stew was not supper but dinner. Yet only one small girl lay under a wool blanket, stained though it was since last night. She had escaped the cold.
The tribunal sat in silence. There was the wind, yes. There was the bubble and pop of that stew. The occasional impolite slurp from Carver. But otherwise, a long silence as the council figured out what to ask.
When he went to refill the bowl, no one dared stop him.
Then came a raucous “Coucou!” coming from the entrance like a bird announcing its intentions, and the hunting party were laughing, hollering, and then all together once more, “Coucou!” With a heave and a ho, expecting some sort of celebration not just for their safe return but for the plentiful bounty they had schlepped all the way back. 35 pounds of meat, plus the weight of the guts and the bones and the antlers of a doe, a deer, a female deer, and leading the hollering was Dok, no longer the mess of a man he was when they’d force him out for his own good last night, but a changed man. A kill under his belt. A chance to feed the party after his medical expertise had failed so many of them, even his own.
He was raving like a man possessed. “Praise be! The Lords have proven our souls with the cold and deemed us worthy a bounty that may seem small, but I swear it can make one good feast for all our spirits. Then, we stretch the rest. Dry it, smoke it, whatever y’all deem appropriate, but grant us just one night fresh. You wouldn’t deny a grieving father that one wish.”
Some men of the jury came to block their way. To settle them. To quiet them. To ease them into the scene they were ignorant of, but all Dok saw was a bunch of spoilsports.
“We won’t get plump off it, I know, but an easy three, four meals might raise the spirits enough to make it through the pass. And the bones? Stew like mama used to make. The fur would be perfect for a few of the kids, too. If my little Tiffany’s had only been replaced sooner, perhaps...” His voice trailed off and they all saw him sinking into the ways that made them send him out. He shook it off. “I’m sorry. It’s a joyous day! A feast! The first deer of the month!”
More men joined the blockade. Dok’s fervor was making everyone uncomfortable. They did not know how to tell him why he should hush up but they needed him to feel it in the air that now was not the time.
Finally, old Edith spoke, “Why did you do it?”
Dok threw a man to the ground. Then, in his ignorance, answered for Carver, “Aren’t you tired of picking fur between your teeth? The leather does nothing for a man’s belly. And I ain’t no dog satisfied by a bone alone,” Dok cried. “These people deserve meat--fresh meat!”
It was the smell that ultimately stopped him. Here he was ranting about some desperate need only for it to already be filled. And when the man he’d just shoved came to him with a tremble of a whisper, Dok looked to the council.
To the stew.
To Carver on his lonesome.
To the deer stained ever so slightly from when it bled out.
To that other stained fur above such a small little once precious lump.
With a wild look in his eyes, Dok flew through the cave and had his hands on Carver, lifting the submitted man to his feet, and all saw the fury of a father, but only some saw how careful Carver was not to spill the bowl. Why let it go to waste after all the trouble it had caused?
Dok snatched it from him. Why should he have it?
The grieving man peered into bowl, so warm within his hands, the steam wetting his face as it melted the ice from his beard, eyebrows, even lashes. A coin of a carrot. A string of meat.
I know what you’re going to be asking.
Why did he do it?
Why did he drink it?
And in answer, all I can offer is, what would you do?
Scene 2 - Waking up in Crescent Hollow
Every good mother coos their baby to sleep with Mother Goose, speaking of cradles in trees, the bough breaking, and down comes baby, cradle and all, and so is it any coincidence that such a common nightmare is falling?
As I awoke, I could swear that dreamy cloud beneath me had given way and so with a start, I tried to sit up, but such a luxurious mattress as I had never in all my years experienced until now made it difficult to rise. The goose down poked through bedclothes that were not mine for these were soft, clean, and wholly without holes. The fine linen sheets had too many threads to be counted and yet they blended so pleasantly to a single soft blanket and ever softer still was the woolen top layer.
But let’s say this luxurious cloud had broken. There was a bough beneath me too mighty to break. It was walnut. Walnut, family, is not native to these parts. It would be as right to haul it from the Vale of Kashmir as it would to take it so unmarred from Appalachia, and still this solid bedstead with rounded, spool-turned posts and a dark polished finish was so fine it could be nothing more. This bed, at one point, might have been reserved for Polk or similar folk, and yet here I was drenching it with my sweat.
I was not entirely to blame for that. Someone had kept a fireplace stoked and the windows shut tight. And that someone, still poking the fireplace to expose untouched wood, was a woman.
Mother Prudence she called herself.
It wouldn’t be right to guess her age. She had the sort of blessed glow that made you not want to look too long. Was it the sunlight streaming through the glass and catching her features jut right? Or was it the ethereal youth lingering past what could be called young? Or was it the shadow of age against that soft, demure smile of hers?
When she spoke, it was soft, a sing-songy voice that seemed to harmonize with itself. In it was something aged, experienced, knowing how to talk to a fellow she wanted something from, and in it was something youthful, innocent, dripping with honey, and in it was something else. Something I couldn’t pin down.
“I’m Mother Prudence,” she said, “and I sit upon the council of aldermen. For another few weeks anyway. This coming election is of some import, but this last week has stolen confidence in me. That’s why I’m here with you.”
“Sorry, ma’am. I know my name. I know my kin. I can still count past ten, but the last few days...”
“A fever,” she said. “A mighty one. Like a trial by fire and you, sir, proved yourself worthy. Praise be.”
“Praise be,” I agreed. “But where are my kin? What happened? Where is this?”
With it so warm in here and so frigid out there, the glass fogged over. Mother Prudence walked over and rather than rub it with her sleeve to give me a peek at the sight outside, she threw open the windows.
A through draft sucked the air right out of the room. My breath went with it. The fire almost went, too. This great whoosh as though the house were exhaling all that old air to breathe in something new.
I must’ve still been weak for such a rush almost made me dizzy, and I thought the fever had returned and with it some delirium for in the midst of the Sierra Nevada such a settlement could not exist. Log cabins, sure. Lean-tos, of course. But a town? A full functioning town? Houses of brick and log with chimneys sending curls of smoke to join the clouds. People bustled about from the stores to get meat and grain and even jars of some sweet preserved, and there was chatter, polite of course, coming on the breeze. How-do-you-dos and catching up and invitations for supper.
“We call it Crescent Hollow,” Mother Prudence said, “because it’s shaped as such, and when the moon comes in just right, we are all that is lit up on Gods’ green Earth.”
The thought of green around these parts made me laugh.
But then, through the window, I saw. Behind the church with the painted red double doors where song came forth was a tree. Not some fir or pine or a conifer of any sort. Something deciduous. Barren at this time of year, yes, but alive, solid, large enough to cast a shadow in the waning light for it was evening, I guessed, for when you’ve been out for three odd days, it only makes sense to have no sense of the hour. But you can tell from the light. And the way this light, actual signs from the heavens, the way they fell it seemed to catch ice upon the branches at such a glint that the tree appeared on fire. It wasn’t, thank goodness. But if it were, so too would the church be, so too would all those houses built of wood despite being well up past the treeline, and maybe not the whole town would catch at first but if that tree were alight and it fell, Crescent Hollow would be no more.
Mother Prudence continued, “And when the moon comes in wrong, we spend it home with our families, in prayer.”
Realizing the hour and seeing the friendly commotion about the Hollow, I can do that much math. These people were headed home for supper. And that means the voices from the church were singing down the sun. A lullaby for it.
And though the song had not finished, from those painted red double doors came a rush of angels, big and small, scattering about the town but not at random.
The children, for all in the choir had been children, hurried to timber posts, singing all the while. And upon each post, a bell, cast iron. And from the bell, a rope. And the denizens of this place stopped to watch. Whether this was a nightly ritual or one done on the Lords’ day, I had no way of knowing for I had no concept of which day today was. But the people paused. Waited. The song continued, the haunting hymn rising to the tallest branches and past them still to the great Heavens above, and this well-practice choir harmonized along a tightrope, the tension, the wobble, wavering until it reached a singularity of voice that if it were one, it were a dozen, all rising to a crescendo that broke to silence before the bells.
Three tolls of each. Less harmonized than the now silent voices.
But at the stroke of three, silence fell upon the Hollow.
Folks did not run.
There was no panic.
It was business as usual, but there was hurry in their steps as the last of the light fell upon their land.
Before I could formulate my first question, Mother Prudence closed the windows and I felt the cold of the air dissipate with the fire, the blankets, the bedclothes.
“Folks have been disappearing,” Mother Prudence said suddenly, in a voice lowering itself. “Three so far. One each night since your arrival.”
She sat in a chair by the bedside table. I saw now, too, that there’d been soup in a bowl that had gone cold waiting for me to arise to hunger for it.
“The timing makes folks want to blame your party, but I’m not. However, I do need it verified for the sake of my people and about the only one with a solid alibi is you, who spent those nights in question in a sweat-drenched tormented delirium.”
She took a deep breath. “I also know who you are to your people. What they think of you. And while the average man, woman, or child might not confide in you, I think we should not start with the average. So perhaps a fellow outcast might trust you, as I’m trusting you.”
Scene 3 - Reunion with folks & meeting new people
In the morning when I was allowed from not just the dwelling but the room itself, I went into search of that scoundrel George. If anyone knew anything, culpable or not, it was him.
I could not find him. The settlement itself, though large based on expectations, was not so large that even a rudimentary patrol would leave corners left unscoured. If he had joined them in the Hollow, he was still in his bedclothes sipping lazily some sweet nectar while the sun was above the ridge, and without beating down the doors of the few dozen houses, I had no way of knowing his hosts. All I could really do was get acquainted with the industrious folks already dressed.
The most industrious was a man, a boy really, thin and slackjawed, selling this coarse brown paper fiddled into some shape and tied with twine. Certainly the paper wrapped about something red, marbled white, something that’d cook up nice, but to call this shop a butcher’s was impossible. A butcher’s, after all, had a haunch hanging by a meathook. It had half a rack of ribs for all to see. It had a display filthy and often flies with wealth that’d dwindle throughout the day as customers came by.
He had the customers. Too cold for the flies.
But where was the display?
Carver waited until he got to the front of the line before asking, “Whatcha got?”
The slackjawed boy’s name was Moses. But such is the role of friends to take a name as holy as this and turn it into something silly: Moose, and were he truly one, he was so thin he’d make the saddest feast even among the party. Here he was slinging meat all day and yet barely had enough to put any on his own bones. Wasn’t a cow leg thick? Didn’t it need that heavy ax-like cleaver to get through? Maybe he’d have an easier go at something like a goat or a sheep, and goats were known to climb this high into the mountains, and sheep came with their own coats, such kind fellows that always shared it with the farmer. Yet, I’d seen nothing of the sort.
Well, Moose didn’t really answer. He just slid that coarse brown paper across to me, tied up with twine. I hadn’t even placed an order. His only explanation was, “Morning, sir.” This butcher certainly had a cheery disposition, polite, too, minding his manners with someone that looked thrice his age but I couldn’t have been more than twice. Maybe it was the mountain that had aged me. The journey. The choices. “You’re with the party, aren’t you? The visitors? Where y’all from?”
“Good ole Springfield. We left on the same trail blazed by Lewis and Clark just to visit you, and Mother Prudence has been so kind as to offer me a bed for recovery the last few days, and I’d awful appreciate it if you gave me your best cut of... what’s on offer?” I asked. “You know, to repay her kindness.”
A little bird spoke from behind me, though in truth it sounded more like singing. “Springfield,” the bird mused like something so ordinary were anything but. “I’d love to see it one day, sir, or just hear about it from you. Is the field full of flowers always?”
When you grow up in paradise, its splendor becomes commonplace. Now, was Springfield paradise? You’d be hard pressed to find a local willing to make that case before a jury of his fellow man and more. But for a young lady such as was before me, one who’d never gone past the Pass, the choir conductor that each twilight instructed her angels to ring those bells placed purposefully at the entrance, for they were not truly exits, to this town, perhaps a locale called Springfield could conjure up images that, if not accurate, were at least pleasant.
“I hope you see it one day,” I told her.
Nell Albright was her name. As mentioned, she was the new choir conductor at the church, I discovered, and if that sounds impressive to you, you have no idea what it means to these folks specific. “Mother Prudence really is so kind she wouldn’t want repayment,” Nell said.
“It’s how my mother raised me unfortunately,” I said. “Even if not today, before I leave, I’d truly like to treat her to something nice, or, rest her soul, my mother will be back and furious.”
“Your good health is surely enough for her heart.”
“But not enough for my conscious,” I say. “Mr. Moose, was it?”
“No one ever gave it a mister before,” the boy said with a laugh.
“If it were this young lady’s birthday--when is that?”
Moose answered not for but just before her, seeming to have it at the tip of his tongue always, “24th of December. Before the Lords’ Day.”
“Lovely that it is coming up. And even with such a fine day coming right after, she deserves to be treated right, celebrated. A lovely chicken-fried steak, drizzled in some creamy peppercorn sauce. Does that sound nice to you, Miss Nell?”
“I can’t say I’ve had the pleasure to taste such a thing, but to my ears, delicious,” she says with a soft smile.
“And you, Mr. Moose, the man of meat, what animal and what cut of that animal would you recommend?” I asked.
Silence fell upon the line that I most definitely was holding up, but nary a peep came from anyone. Only Nell chimed in to be kind to me. Others spoke to their neighbors, catching up with folks they saw yesterday before the bells. Others stayed quiet, in that mid-morning contemplation of the day ahead with so little behind. But not a grumble. Not a groan. Not so much as a cough in my direction to quit with the chit-chat and take the meat served before me wrapped in brown.
“Sir,” Nell said as we waited, “I must say it’s good to see you up. I wasn’t sure at first, but you were the one who wandered in ahead of your party, weren’t you? You looked like death and I feared it hung on you.”
“It might still. I’d appreciate if kept worrying a little longer,” I told her.
“Me too,” Moose added.
“I’m still waiting on an answer from you, sir.”
“Have you had any trouble with the locals?” Nell asked. “I don’t want you to think our town unkind, but folks pass through pretty regular. Others can get quite hard-hearted about visitors.”
“No one has said anything meaner than good morning,” I told her. “Would you say it’s normal for your people to be unkind? Not that I’ve seen any such thing, of course. I’m just curious if it’s normal or if they’re suspicious? I hear there’ve been disappearances.”
“Unfortunately, yes. I hope it’s as simple as they wandered off, but it’s never so simple, I fear.”
She stood in a long silence of contemplation for the fate of the souls lost to the mountain, trying to recall memories of the missing, to summon those feelings of fondness toward her neighbors, and appreciation for those she still had. You could see a whole journey upon her pale face as she sighed, her shoulders rising and falling through the peaks and valleys of the remembrance.
Her eyes darted to her angels’ bells, which stood before the entrance. I desperately wanted to hear the history behind them at that moment but I had one question hanging and I did not need another. There were eights bells, an undeniable fact, but the arrangement was something odd. As a child, if you were so fortunate to sit in a schoolroom and recite your grammar, your mind--and hand--naturally wandered. The most exciting of moments was when you learned to draw that five-pointed star. But the worst moment? Was learning a friend started wrong. I think all civilized folk can agree: the left foot of the star is #1, not the damn right arm, Louie. I swear. Then, from that leg, it’s a simple matter of touching the head, right? Continue on and you’ve got yourself a star. Now, I’ve always been something of a visualizer. It helped me immensely when I started in the cartography business, not just leading the way, but mapping it for those who came after. Such a skill requires a mind able to not just draw shapes but see the ones that naturally exist within the world, and there are many granted to us by our Creators. There’s one I think we all know that appears in flowers. It appears in snail shells. Before it ever dripped from the ink-dipped reed of Euclid, before it showed itself to his mind’s eye, it appeared on his ear. There are many more such sacred geometry if you’re willing and able to recognize a pattern, and the way Crescent Hollow was laid out, I want you to imagine two stars overlaid on top of one another; with your mind, rotate the one 180 degrees so one head is between the other’s feet. How many points you got?
So then tell me! Why! Why were there only eight paths into this accursed place?
Sorry.
I shouldn’t let the pleasant mask I had long since learned to plaster on to twitch, to crack, to break.
“Sir,” Moose said finally and I thought we were in for blessed news that might reverse my spirit, but then he pointed to one of those bell-marked entrances.
At first, I did not see his point.
There were two men coming through, hunters I thought, bringing whatever carcass was available around these parts for him to butcher and hey, that would be enlightening, but no. They were not hunters. They were out of breath. Not quite frantic, but an urgency to their step. They were requesting aid of anyone available and willing and bearing arms.
Moose went to see the fuss, as did Nell and the half the line behind us. I hadn’t even paid and yet I had that brown-wrapped hunk of something in my hand. I started over, too, when some familiar faces appeared gawking at the same sight as the rest of us, but familiar don’t always mean friendly and when they saw mine, no, they didn’t.
“How do you do?” I said politely.
“How do you do?” Alma said back. She was the eldest daughter of one of the owners of a covered wagon. I once knew his name well, but since it’s been lost. But Alma, she’s like a crystal within my mind. Some wispy blonde hairs always stuck to her forehead. She had a propensity for darker colors, not just dark fabrics that were charcoal or slate or some other shade of gray, but actual colors. Navy or forest. While others were as well camouflaged as a snowy owl, she stood out always and perhaps that’s why she stuck in my mind while her father, from his face to his voice to his entire existence, is a void that is only known to exist by its effects around it.
Reuben, the boy with her, was sweet on her, I knew that much, but not how much it was requited. But being of similar age, they got along well as friends. He was cheerful. Often too much, but not always, and one such time was now. He was not so rude as to not even return a nod. Otherwise, he was silent in my presence.
“Were you lot here for the bells last night?” I asked, hoping they could shed light on it.
“You get used to it,” Alma replied.
That answered one question.
“I guess you’ve been here a few days then,” I said and got nods. “How are these folks? Of course kind, but could you tell me more?”
Alma shrugged, but Reuben took more to mean more on kind. “They’re kind enough to share their food, their homes, their warm fires. They even promised whatever supplies we needed that they had were ours when we left, but kindest of all, a few have been helping us with the wagons. Some made it close to the summit, wouldn’t you know? But the snow’s too deep and they couldn’t get past, so we’ve been taking trips each day to clear the way a little, push the wagon a little further, grab what we need,” he explained.
“Mighty kind.”
“They are, to a fault. It’s why when you came stumbling in ranting and raving about some such nonsense as you are want to do, they blamed a fever and took care of you while you were in your stupor.”
“Ranting? Raving? About what I don’t know, but I wish I could remember.”
“I wish you remembered you weren’t alone,” Reuben muttered.
“And who said I didn’t, boy?” I shot back with no cap on my tone. “I was not as fortunate as you to be staying with your fire. With your people. With your food. I went out and found this place, even if I could not find my way back, but these people, kind as they are, did and you should count yourself fortunate they did. Only reason I don’t box your ear here and now is that I don’t want them knowing I am not so kind.”
“Dok Neeka’s out searching for them,” Alma said quietly. “With Hastings and the others. They did not arrive with you, as the town tells us.”
I realized in the midst of my tantrum, unsightly as it was, I had squeezed the meat out of its packaging. I did not wish to inspect it now.
“I don’t know why they bothered dragging him out,” Reuben said, eyes on the snow as he drew a line with his toe. “What does he ever do when someone’s hurt? Explaining the difference between a rectangle and a rhombus ain’t doing nothing but putting them to rest. Ain’t gonna help with blackened toes.”
“I don’t see you out there, Ben,” Alma said.
“I know I’d be useless at least. A body in a room isn’t always better than an empty one.”
“In this case, he’s got hands, a back, and working legs, and whether they find friend or freight, he can help bring them here. And if they find nothing, there’s plenty of meat going around to revitalize us for another attempt tomorrow.”
“Enough bickering, children,” I said, having calmed myself. “The meat. Don’t you find it the least bit odd?”
“Don’t see your own devils in the visage of others,” Reuben spat.
And truly I would have beat him something fierce before all to see, except one new set of eyes had arrived to witness that put me frozen in my place. Dok Neeka was back, among three others, having gone out as a party of five and if there were questions about what had happened, the fourth, one such man that Reuben had rightly stated was beyond the Dok’s abilities could not walk, for to walk required the heart to pump clean fresh blood to the muscles, and even with the field dressing that any hunter could do tied about the stumpy remnant, that man’s heart only pumped blood into leaking bandages, stained as red as the snow behind him.
Scene 4 - Introduce Caleb
When Alma, Reuben, and I came running, Dok already had assigned roles to the crowd of onlookers with most falling into the “get back” role. The leg, now that I could see it up close, was wrapped in cloth bandages around some woolen layer, perhaps a shirt, that had completely soaked through, but the real interesting part was just above the knee. A tourniquet. It was made from one of Dok’s suspenders and I knew it was his because as he barked orders, he had to hold up half his trousers to be polite.
“Get your hand off that,” Dok commanded. His tone alone held enough authority that the well-meaning fellow put his hands to the sky like someone had a gun on him. “I need a house set afire boiling a big pot cooking all the cloth you can spare. Ma’am, can I trust you to slap him?”
The shock of the question offset the shock of the scene and she agreed.
“We’re not here to hurt him but keep him awake. Slap, shout, whatever it takes but if he falls asleep...” Dok’s words dropped with his eyes. He did not wish to finish such a sentence in case the man was lucid enough to process it.
With my work in the wilderness, I’d seen gruesome wounds before, praise be never having experienced one myself, and while I could not fix a thing, I at least would not shy away at the sight of blood. I attempted to support the man on his mangled side so it would not continue dragging in the snow. Some of my folks stopped me.
“What happened?” Alma asked.
“What happened indeed?” some lady said and looked at me.
“Oh quit that! He’s been here all morning.” Alma slapped Reuben’s chest. “Tell’em.”
Reuben did as instructed, though quietly.
“‘Tis a sin to listen to false witness.”
“It ain’t false!” Reuben’s voice was quiet no longer. “And I’d be the first to say it were.”
But the emergency fell by the wayside as there was more important matters to attend: spiting me. And soon it was a yelling match.
“He’s got the morning Moose meat,” Alma said, holding up my hand like I’d won something, but it did little to quell the crowd. Put a person in front of me and we can have a conversation. Put a whole mess of folk and they’re already entrenched in a position. Throw in an emergency and they’d swear it was not the time for discussing nothing and I’d agree, which is why I said nothing.
Maybe Dok didn’t have any real medical training, but he got his name being smart, so smart they shipped him off to Göttingen for some fancy piece of paper and a title, and if someone can process the mess of Deutsch spelling, their brain can process a lot of information quite quickly relative to the rest of us. So he heard the commotion around him shift focus from the fresh trauma to an old one, spotted my ugly mug, and put two and two together. The fellow sure was good at math.
His voice rose. “You can either hate on that man or save this one, but there is not time for both!”
And with that I was allowed to support the man’s mangled side so it did not drag limply through the snow as we carried him to the nearest house with cloth stewing in a pot on a fire.
We set the man on the table. His face was red from the icy cold wind but also from the lady slapping him. If he was awake, it was only barely, but it was nice that she was the only noise around. There were fewer than 7 us in the house now. Dok, the injured, the slapper, the homeowners, and me.
“Do not touch the tourniquet.” He repeated this twice more. He even tightened that branch for good measure. It was as thick and oblong as a child’s wrist, and as he twisted, the man grimaced and that seemed like good news. There was still feeling above the knee.
“Sir, ma’am, we need blankets if you can spare them. They’ll just be for his chest, but if you’re worried, put the spares down first, then the rest, and that should save the good ones from staining, I would think. But he needs to be warm.”
Dok looked at the man. At his leg, roughly bandaged, leaking on the dining table. I watched him take it in. Watched him think what next. Watched his eyes dart up and back as he tried to recall something, maybe something he heard or something he witnesses or most probably something he read. And in the end, I watched him hesitate as he came up with nothing.
So I asked, “What next?”
“Let’s get that boot off,” Dok said and as I did, strings of half congealed blood followed. The foot itself was pale. Limp.
After waiting too long with it in my hand, I called out to him. “Dok?”
“We need to look at the wound. Are you squeamish?”
“No.”
“I am.”
“Get the Dok a bucket, would you?” I called.
And he needed it. I almost did, too, as I peeled back what I now saw was a wool cap from the wound. I can only tell you what it looked like but Dok provided the jargon that was beyond me. A severely displaced, open fracture of the lower leg. Both the tibia and fibula had done significant damage to the muscles and vessels. Blood pumps from the heart, any fool knows that, so with the tourniquet applied so tight, this wound didn’t gush. It oozed. Gravity dragged the remainder toward the openings and pressure, covering, and the chill had stopped most of it.
“What happened?” I said.
The slapper looked and while her hand froze, her shouting turned to a piercing shriek and the man of the house had to escort her away to calm herself and himself as well. I could still hear her crying from the other room. The wife did not blink. Maybe she’d seen worse living up here so long.
“They tell me he and Caleb went up high to get a better look,” Dok said. “And well, it must’ve been icy.”
In the rush of emotion, things must’ve been a blur for those closest to the accident, or perhaps incident, but for me, coming in after, I had a crystallized view of the moment frozen within my memory and I can assure you, family, Caleb was not among the returning.
“What now?” I asked. These short simple questions seemed to push the man past his moments of diffidence where he thought the more he thought the closer he’d get to an answer but in truth, we needed swift, decisive action.
But the third time, the charm ran out.
Peering into the mangled flesh, yes, he could identify the anatomical pieces, making a reasonable conclusion as to the cause and effect, even take initial steps, but faced with a true decision...
“Do we amputate?” the lady of the house asked.
“I don’t know how--I don’t have any tools for that,” Dok stammered.
The slapper was back without the husband for he was not quite ready while she was more composed, or at least composed enough not to look, and she was ready to resume her duties but when she asked if she should, Dok repeated, “I don’t know.”
And when there was a knock on the door, the town surgeon had come to relieve us of the problem, we should have been thankful for such a terrible responsibility being lifted, but then we walked outside, Dok still covered in the man’s blood while I only had it on my hands, the folks asked if the man would be alright, and can you guess Dok’s answer?
“I don’t know.”
~
We sat in the church, covered in another man’s blood, not knowing his fate or our hand in it. While the Dok cast thoughts inward, my eyes scanned outward. It was my first time in here after all. The church was being used as the schoolhouse with Nell leading the lesson as she conducted the choir. They was doing math.
When you’re limited by space and resources, you make do. What appears to my outside eyes as odd decisions for decor have their reasons, even if I can’t see their lineage within the walls themselves. Excuse me while I save judgment then for later and focus instead on Dok.
It was cold, even in here, and his trousers kept slipping more than what might be appropriate for a church, but still the trembling--I don’t think it was the cold.
“Amputation doesn’t have a low mortality rate,” he mumbled. “All the way up here? Probably not even a drop laudanum. Maybe a swig of swill, sending the lady away since the man does not need to be awake for this, and then...” He stopped to listen, and, the way those bells reverberated through the vale, if there was something to listen to, it’d be audible in the Hollow.
When I started, he raised a hand and we waited a little longer. My patience runs dry quickly, but still I granted him this little extra silence where it was just us, the lesson, and our heartbeats. Maybe the children reciting their tables brought some comfort to the mathematician. I suppose there is an order to numbers, undeniable qualities that after you forget your name, forget your face, forget your family, numbers will continue doing what they do, won’t they?
“Can you tell me why those folks went out?”
Such a simple question, one I could surmise the answer to, grounded him. “Not all of us are here. Some still at the caverns. Others at the cabins. But this blizzard’s got everyone turned around and routes blocked off,” he explained. “If there are still... let’s say 60 of us, we have roughly a third accounted for. George and them are still miles back, of course. Can’t do much but leave trail markers. But for the others, we need to let them know there’s a place to stay. Warmth. Food! They don’t have to... anymore.”
The dour note ended it for a moment and he continued listening to the lesson. His ears perked up as he heard a mistake but Ms. Albright was quick to correct and the sequence started over again.
“I figured as much,” I said. “The problem is it’s an inefficient way of doing it. Come. I’ma need you.”
We chose the church, not just for its warmth, but many felt themselves too unclean to enter. Others felt since I crossed the threshold without any divine retribution, maybe that place wasn’t as consecrated as it should’ve been. Regardless the reason, it was a place for quiet but now I had a plan but we needed people.
Bringing Dok out triggered a swarm of folks wanting more information, information he did not have. And as they asked questions, I started making a proposal.
“Folks, these searches you’re doing aren’t doing enough.”
“Fine of you to say after taking days to yourself, m’lord,” someone spat.
“Where’d you go yesterday?” I pulled out a parchment. Drew a dot at the center for the Hollow, then several more for the entrances.
There was a murmur through the crowd. Several. Spinning this way and that. Pointing to one bell post before disagreeing, some so vehemently that a finger got slapped down here and there. They called for who went out and no one could quite remember if they went out yesterday or the day before.
I waited.
It settled and they turned back toward me. The atmosphere was sort of a “I won’t tell you! But if you happen to overhear me discussing it with them, so be it.”
Through all that, I gathered what I knew and that was that no one knew.
“This is what I mean when I say you aren’t doing jack going at random. Folks wandered through the desert for 40 years and I don’t think many of us wish to do the same. So starting tomorrow, we designate two entrance to start. These need to be opposite one another. Two parties go out. They walk however many steps to get far enough away that no one could spot the Hollow from that distance, and I imagine with the snow and wind that distance isn’t as far as you might expect. We mark a point as the center. Then walk another few hundred steps and mark that point on the uh... Dok, what do you call the edge of a circle?”
“Circumference.”
“Mark the point on the circumference. You’re going to patrol in a circle. If you find something, someone, someway, great, but you probably won’t that day. So the next day, you go out and what used to be your center point swap it with the point on the circumference and patrol a new circle. You’ll overlap it, see, and then if you missed something day 1, you might find it day 2. And since there are two search parties, we go clockwise, slowly moving the circle each time we go out. You see?”
The folks did not see. One, they did not want to see if it was me showing them. Two, it was a complicated plan to explain with words alone. Thankfully, Dok caught on and was already wiping his hands in the snow to get that blood off them. Once clean, as clean as snow gets them anyway, he grabbed that parchment from me and drew the Day 1 circles on opposite sides of the town. Then he drew two more, overlapping with the first, for Day 2.
“It’s simple translation,” he said.
“Dok, we all speaking the Gods’ tongue here.”
He was giddy getting to explain some concept. “Translation is taking the same shape and moving it to another point. This one overlaps so it’s not quite tesselation, but you get it?”
He didn’t say anything I didn’t, but the folks wanted to listen to him, and admittedly, the visual gave folks something to hang their hat on, so in the end, they kind of got it. “It ain’t that late,” one said. “Why wait?”
The people in town were frenetic with purpose, ready to get started, to feel useful, and ready to leave before the surgery started, and if they had listened to me when I explained it, perhaps they could’ve avoided hear the bloodcurdling scream from within the the house. It wasn’t just the patient either. The assistants, nurses if you will, were shouting, too. You could just hear it through the windows, though they were closed, how they shouted to hold him down, hold him steady, stick that stick in his mouth if you have to.
Once there was a break in the pain and we could hear each other once more, I said, “I have been taking too many days to myself, as you said, so I’d be happy to go out.”
Whether it was the screams or the thought of going with me, that hunger to help slipped right out on a breeze.
“I get it,” I shouted back at their silence as a man is wont to do when that frustration builds to a boil. “But the sooner we go out, the sooner we find Caleb. You want him out there on his own?”
The murmurs began again. The folks whispering to one another. Some were not aware that it was Caleb that had not returned with the party and I could see the looms in their eyes spinning up the stories.
“I’ll go with you.” Alma pulled poor Reuben in, too. “Dok?”
The man was still fiddling with my parchment, looking at the arrangement of circles. He had several more and I think that means it was his to keep since no one else could understand a lick of it. And with four decided going out a west entrance, suddenly a party was quick to form to go out an eastern one. So be it.
Scene 1 - Prologue - Tribunal for Enoch Carver
Establish the Hastings Cutoff led them to the Sierra Nevada Mountains (Donner party fact)
Within a frozen cave, Carver kneels with his head down over a bowl of stew.
There is a cauldron on a fire between Carver and the council.
The folks have backed against the wall.
Despite the fire, the cave is cold unless you get real close.
The attitude is eerie.
The smell delicious.
There’s a stained blanket over a small lump of something (implied a body)
Dok Neeka brings in a hunting party dragging in a small doe, crying out “Praise be to the Lords for the Lords have proven our souls and deemed us worthy of a small bounty.”
Someone tries to stop him from coming in. “Now it may not be enough to keep us plump but we can get a good three, four meals out of it and the bones? Stew like mama used to make. The fur would be perfect for a few of the kids. If my little Tiffany’s had only been replaced sooner, perhaps... I’m sorry, this should be joyous! A feast!”
His fervor echoes in the cave but dies among the people.
“Why you do it?” a councilman says.
Dok is arguing with someone trying to keep him out, “I’m tired of picking fur from my teeth. The chew of leather does nothing for my belly and I sure as calamity ain’t no damn dog. These people need meat. Fresh meat!”
Whispers are exchanged between Dok and another man.
Dok looks to the stew.
To Carver.
To the deer.
Dok rushes past the fire to Carver with a wild look in his eye.
He snatches up the bowl of stew.
Sees the strings of meat inside.
Then drinks it.
Scene 2
Viewpoint - Carver (1st person?)
Beats
Carver wakes up in a soft, fluffy bed, covered in woolen blankets with the smell of something delicious by his bedside.
He’s wearing clean bedclothes that are not his own
The fireplace is going and a woman (Mother Prudence) is poking it
It wouldn’t be right to guess her age as youthful
She had the sort of blessed glow that made you not want to look too long. Was it the sunlight streaming through the window and catching her features just right? Or was it the ethereal youth lingering past what could be called young? Or was it the shadow of age against that soft, demure smile of hers?
“I’m Mother Prudence,” she said softly. It was a sing-songy voice that seemed to harmonize with itself. In it was something aged, experienced, knowing how to talk to a man, and in it was something youthful, innocent and dripping with honey, but also, in it was something else. “I sit upon the alderman council, at least for another few weeks. This election is of some import, but this last week has perhaps stolen folks confidence in me. That’s why I’m here with you.”
Confused
Carver’s asking about his people, hearing voices out the window, but none that he recognizes
“Sorry, ma’am. I don’t mean to interrupt your own musings, but I’ve gotta ask. Where did we wander to? I know my name and my kin and even how to count past ten, but the last few days.”
“A fever. A mighty one. Perhaps some trial by fire.”
Mother Prudence explains this is Crescent Hollow because it’s shaped like that and when the moon comes in just right we’re all that’s lit up on Gods’ green Earth.
Carver laughs at the thought of Green.
And when it comes in just wrong, on a gibbous... we stay in with our families and get closer to our Lords.
Sense of Discovery
Mother Prudence opens the window to let in fresh air for Carver
A through draft blows through. There is a moment where Carver’s breath gets sucked out of him and the fire almost goes too. Then it settles.
Carver sees the wonderland before him.
An actual settlement. Plenty of houses, not just shoddy lean-tos and sod, but full houses of brick and log. Chimneys with curls of smoke. People bustling about, heading to the store or a schoolhouse or a church, a fully raised and consecrated place of worship and... was that singing? Furthermore, was that a tree? Way up here past the treeline in the midst of an eternal winter and there was a tree catching the light--actual signs from the heaven!--looking as if it were on fire, a controlled candle-like burn, but it couldn’t be. Not with this wind. Not with this cold. Not way up there on a tree that shadowed the village at this late evening hour. When you’ve been asleep all day and for all the days since apparent arrival, it only made sense Carver had no concept of the hour. That these folks bustling about the Hollow were headed home for supper.
That the choir at the church was singing down the sun and when they finished, a rush of angels, big and small, came out the painted red double doors and scattered about the village, but not to escape their heavenly duties, not at random at all, but to man separate posts. Tall, wooden posts driven deep in the ground spread throughout the Hollow. Mounted upon them were bells, cast iron things. From the bells, a rope. And as the little angels arrived to their placements, the townfolk stopped in witness. Whether this happened every evening or every Sunday, Carver couldn’t say for he had no concept if today were the Lords’ day, but whatever the ritual happening out the window, everyone paused. Waited. And then their voices sang out once more, some haunting hymn raised to the highest branches of that tree and a great probably beyond to the heavens themselves, some well-practiced choir beseeching them, rising in harmony so perfect whether it was a dozen or a hundred it came out as one, growing louder and louder as the wavering voices found that singular tightrope and walked it straight to the moon, the near new moon, in a crescendo that broke to silence before the bells.
Then the folks rushed home. They did not run. There was no panic. It was business as usual. But there was hurry, and for Carver, a lot of questions, but Mother Prudence shut the window.
Unsettled
Carver has a lot of questions but before he can formulate which one to ask first, Mother Prudence tells him, “Folks have been disappearing. Three so far.”
“The timing makes it easy to, but I’m not blaming your party. But I need it verified and about the only one with a solid alibi is you, the man that spent the last few days tormented in a sweat-filled delirium.”
“But also I know who you are to these people. What they think of you. And while the average man, woman, or child won’t confide in you, if anyone’s done something they shouldn’t, you might hear something, one outcast to another.”
Surprise
Scene 3
Mystery
In the morning, Carver goes around town looking for his own people
Looking specifically for that scoundrel George
The townsfolk tell Carver that George & Jacob might be out scouting
New uncanny folk
Moose, the butcher boy - wants to welcome outsider but also misses home after coming as a visitor himself
Nell Albright, the young choir conductor - wants to see the world through outsiders eyes as she’s never left home
Carver hasn’t seen any animals about town.
He is asking where they get the meat
Interrupted and the conversation moves on
Carver is looking into the missing people, but also is curious about Mother Prudence
The mention of Mother Prudence gets no reaction
Everyone he speaks to seems to pleasant toward him (pleasantville vibes?)
But they speak of others being wary of the strangers’ arrival coinciding with the disappearances
He doesn’t meet anyone wary, though
Are they hiding it or is it just a vocal minority he hasn’t heard from yet?
Disbelief over the town’s structure. Each bell is positioned at an exit from town arranged at the point of one of two 5-point stars, but there were eight bells (Sacred Geometry)
Finally encounters folks from his own party
Meets Alma and Reuben who greet him coldly (Hollow is friendly toward Carver but his own people are not, when you’d expect opposite?)
Discussing last night’s weird bell ritual
You get used to it (implying it is every night)
Asking about what happened the last few days
Well, the kind folks here said you wandered in half out of your mind, ranting and raving before falling to a stupor.
You think I’d remember that.
You’d also think you’d remember the others with you.
Carver genuinely caught off guard. “Aren’t they here?”
“The search party will find them. Dok is with them in case someone’s hurt.”
“Yeah, after dragging him out of his room.”
“I don’t see you out there.”
“I know I wouldn’t be of any use. He’s not even a real doctor. What good’s knowing a rhombus from a rectangle going to do for a fellow half frozen to death with black toes?”
“At least he’s another set of hands. And there’s plenty of meat going around.”
Carver interrupts finally, “About that. Don’t you find it strange?”
The question lingers as the arrival of Dok Neeka & others carrying back Ruth.
Caleb, the party’s butcher, isn’t back
Warmth of reunion even when rejected by his own folk
Worry for his people out in the cold
Scene 4
Beats
Dok Neeka calls for all available hands to treat the wounded man from the search party
Severely displaced open fracture of the lower leg
Significant damage to the muscle & blood vessels
Tourniquet above the wound made of a suspender (leading to his trousers half-falling down) and a branch as thick and oblong as a child’s wrist
The foot is pale from loss of blood
Not pumping excessive blood, but oozing as it’s dragged
What happened? Carver asks
They found him like this
Suspicion immediately turns on Carver
Alma defends him saying he was here, forcing Reuben to testify too.
Someone says don’t listen to a false witness
It ain’t false! Look! He’s got the morning meat from Moose.
Carver just endures while people bicker and then Dok tells them all to shut up and get some help
You can either hate on that man or save this one but there is not time for both!
What has happened to the man? A fall, implying someone pushed him, trying to make his death look accidental
They get to work patching him up
Do not remove the tourniquet
Get the fire roaring and boil some water and cloth in that water
Smother him in blankets or he’ll freeze
Dok assigns someone to “slap and shout at the man because if that man falls asleep he’s...” not willing to finish the sentence while the man might still be conscious
The foot is cold and pale. Is it already dead or is it just the loss of blood from the tourniquet? Dok doesn’t know. Panic. People asking him what to do. What he needs. What they can do to help. Will he be OK
“I don’t know.”
The town surgeon arrives to begin amputation, knowing it may not save the man, but also that doing nothing is guaranteed death
Shift from medical dilemma to Carver
Carver’s trying to find out what happened and it’s a situation of “I ain’t telling you... but I’ll tell these other people while you’re within earshot.”
The person missing is Caleb.
Upon hearing that, there are some whispers about his behavior lately
Carver sets up the search party routines after no one can tell him where exactly they searched, both due to reluctance to tell him anything and due to not knowing
You take opposite entrances to the Hollow and you walk X many paces to arrive at your central point. Mark it how you please. Then take X many more paces to arrive at a point that will be on the circumference of your patrol area. You’ll walk a large circle the best you can and if you find something, someone, or someway, great, but chances are you won’t today. So you come back tomorrow to that same central point. It’s now your circumference point. Walk the large circle again. You’ll overlap partially and then we can be certain there’s nothing. The two groups go clockwise and if that first ring around the village comes up with nothing, then we go a layer deeper.
The search party doesn’t understand the complicated explanation nor do they trust Carver enough to accept what he’s saying has any sense to it, giving excuses about how he’s still feverish or he’s half the reason wer’re in this mess to start
Dok jumps in, understanding and feeling useful again.
Still covered in blood, still trousers falling down on one side
“It’s simple translation.”
“Dok, we all speak the Gods’ tongue out here.”
Translation, Dok explains, is a mathematical concept of taking the same shape and moving it to a new position.
Draws in his journal the Day 1 circles, then Day 2.
The people, trusting Dok more than Carver, understand it.
The party sees that it does a thorough job of covering ground and plan to start today. Carver offers to go with them, but no one wants him in their party so Dok joins Carver. Alma forces Reuben to join
Carver is still thinking back to Caleb
Dok is still thinking about the circles he started drawing in the journal
Mythos
Ramble:
The search parties are going out at random before Carver wakes up and it’s getting them nowhere. Maybe they find stuff, but they can’t find the pass out of here and the directions the locals give them isn’t helpful, Carver uncovers during his investigation
His party needs him despite tension with him
Tension with him despite them partaking in the same thing he is socially outcast for
Carver suggests two parties going out opposite paths. Go X many steps straight. That’s the center. Then from the center another X many steps to get to the perimeter where you walk in a circle, doesn’t have to be exact. You find something or someone or someway and great! But if not, the next day, we do the same but now that central point at the circle becomes the perimeter and you find the new center and patrol around it. See, this way they’re overlap and what you missed Day 1 might get caught on Day 2 or what have you.
Flower of life created by search parties
The only circle not intruded on is the town because if anything or anyone or anyway were there, then they’d have told you
Right?
But they didn’t and it’s the final circle to complete, ushering in the Silence to Prevent Hastur
Circle Dance
Start the story around a waning crescent moon (good times!) and then on the new moon, this is the only time they go outside in the dark of night as there is no moonlight, no watchful eye, no Hushward, and they have a town gathering with music and food and it’s a raucous occasion for a sleepy village tucked away in the mountains. It culminates in a circle dance, which for Dok, already starting to grow obsessed with the Flower of Life, tesselation, and fractals, it pushes him deeper into a mania about them as he experiences the rush of whirling around with other people beneath the moon.
Festival as an early climax without a clear conflict but it’s a night of significance that will mirror the real climax under the full moon.
Fractals as a Gateway
As Carver directs the search party, he tells two parties to go out opposite entrances for X many steps. That point is the center. Then X many more to reach the circumference. Walk in a circle to search for something, someone, or someway out. If you don’t get lucky, you come back the next day. Now that center point becomes the circumference point for a circle moved clockwise so the two parties don’t run into each other. We want some overlap but not too much. Carver explains but folks are confused and distrusting.
Dok Neeka understands and describes it as simple translation.
“Dok, we’re all speaking the Gods’ tongue. We just don’t understand it.” Getting mad as they try.
But in math, translation is taking the same shape and repeating it at another point.
Then Dok draws it, showing Day 1 with just 2 circles, then Day 2 with 2 more. The party understands now and they trust Dok Neeka more than Carver so they go with it.
But Dok Neeka’s been locking himself up within his room, even during daylight, something that seemed so rare until they got here. He continues the pattern to Day 3, 4, and more.
6, 7, what is this gate?
9, 10, when does it end?
12, 13, for Tiff, he continues.
This slowly starts to form the Flower of Life. He notices one sliver of overlap toward the edge is yellowed, which is odd as the paper he chose was not perfect but certainly not old enough to yellow.
He starts drawing it again, obsessed by its patterns, but the second drawing does not scratch the same itch as the first for its too simple and merely visually vexing. It is the gateway of a vestibule but the exit itself. It is a poor man’s fractal, which have a self-repeating pattern of different scales
He starts working out the math to try to transform the flower of life into a fractal but he can’t. Instead he’s making other fractals and each time, some tiny part of the repeating pattern is yellow, and as he draws more, he swears the piece that is yellow is bigger each time.
(True Name?) The Hushward
An eldritch beadle meant to prevent fools from opening the wrong door at the wrong time to summon Hastur the Unspeakable One (the king in yellow). The Hushward does this through two tactics: memory and silence. Within his domain, memories can be suppressed and eventually forgotten. Such too is true of noise. Too much noise attracts The Hushward but to get around this, a consistent pattern of sound (nightly choir and ringing of the bells) placates him.
The Hushward causes Dok Neeka to forget that he’s drawing these fractals or the flower of life as they can summon the King in Yellow. But Dok Neeka is a mathematician and he continues to derive the mathematical concepts that lead to drawing fractals. He’s a man possessed because within the fractals he sees his family. As The Hushward continues to affect his memory, Dok no longer realizes who these people are within the fractals, but he now thirsts to know who they are, and as he continues to draw, he stumbles upon the Mandelbrot set where the King in Yellow resides.
The Hushward also suppresses people’s memories within town, causing some of the party to forget they too have tasted human flesh, preventing them from turning into Wendigos because they also forget their own guilt, while not forgetting Carver’s.
Wendigo
Wendigos are created by being consumed by the guilt of eating human flesh and yet continuing to do so. So those who eat and did not enjoy but did so out of necessity are safe. Those who eat and enjoyed but convince themselves they did nothing wrong are safe. Those that felt guilt before come to Crescent Hollow and start to forget their own guilt.
This ties into the theme of if I don’t remember doing something, am I still culpable of it? Carver believes yes, and he carries his guilt around with him.