Scratch

By Wayne Wise

Like all small rural towns, Canaan, West Virginia has its secrets: lies, infidelities, and even murder are kept hidden in the minds of the residents there. But there is one secret they will go to any lengths to protect.

A little girl named Gabrielle, believed to be an angel, has been kept chained in the church basement for over a century now, prisoner of an ancient pact. Unaging and unearthly beautiful, Gabrielle has the power to heal.

A madman pursues outsiders Adam and Holly Mansfield to Canaan, intent on kidnapping their daughter. Once there they discover there is one other secret in Canaan.

Chained deep in the heart of the mountain is another being, a demon called Scratch. If Gabrielle is freed, Scratch will be as well, and his vengeance and evil will consume the town.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Wayne Wise
• Release date: Aug 28, 2011
• ISBN: 9781465752833

Wayne Wise

Wayne Wise is a writer, artist, storyteller, seeker shaman and magician, or at least claims to be in casual conversation. He has a BA in History and an MA in Clinical Psychology and in his life has worked as a counsellor, an administrative assistant for a state legislator, an inter-office mail courier, a freelance comic book inker, and a department store Santa. He wrote music and comics-based articles for several local news mags and a couple of now-defunct national magazines. In 1993 he and his business partner/collaborator Fred Wheaton won the Xeric Grant and self-published the comic book Grey Legacy. In 2010 he wrote and drew a follow-up called Grey Legacy Tales. Raised in rural southwestern Pennsylvania he is currently employed by the Eisner Award-nominated comic book store Phantom of the Attic in Pittsburgh and recently taught a course in Comics and Pop Culture as a guest lecturer at Chatham University.

Book preview

PROLOGUE

Reverend Raz Toland balanced the tray on one hand and flipped on the light switch at the top of the stairs. One bare bulb illuminated the basement of the First Church of the Blessed Angel of Canaan, West Virginia, casting harsh shadows to the accompaniment of a static hiss. With his free hand rubbing along the rough stone wall, Reverend Raz descended the warped wooden steps. The air was chilly and damp, scented with cedar, old furniture polish, and an overture of must.

Raz set the tray on top of a crate of old church circulars. The bowl of broth steamed as he fished in the pocket of his ill-tailored dress slacks. He pulled a single key into the light and felt the significant weight of it in his palm. He pushed on the side of a large bookshelf that sat against the far wall. It slid to the side easily on rollers, revealing a thick wooden door. A massive, ornately designed padlock hung from a heavy hasp.

He heard footsteps in the church above his head as people began to arrive for the Wednesday night prayer meeting. The first tentative notes of a hymn limped their way out of the piano under the widow Nellie Claremont’s swollen, arthritic fingers.

With a mumbled invocation Raz stuck the key in the slot and turned. The lock popped open with a screech and a click. Raz dropped the key back into his pocket and picked up the tray. He pushed the door open and stepped through.

Gabrielle, he whispered to the girl who slept inside the dark room. It’s time.

As her eyes slowly opened, Reverend Raz was overwhelmed for what seemed to be the millionth time at the beauty of his charge. A silent prayer, thanking the Lord for allowing him to be her keeper, winged its way toward Heaven. He wiped a tear from his eye as she sat on the edge of the small cot, illuminated by the light from behind him.

She was small and slender, and though her true age was unknowable, she appeared to be about ten years old. Her hair was long, light silver blonde in hue, and made silk seem coarse in comparison. She opened eyes that were as blue as the sky that must float above Paradise, nearly too blue to comprehend. Thin pale limbs spilled from the shapeless white shift that was her only clothing. Her wrists were nearly narrow enough for her to slip her hands out of the rusty iron shackles that held her chained to the damp basement wall.

Hurry up. Reverend Toland handed the bowl of lukewarm chicken noodle soup to the girl. The congregation is starting to gather. Gabrielle took the bowl and began to eat.

I’m expecting a big crowd tonight, he continued as he took a clean white dress from a battered chest of drawers. Gonna be a lot of sick folks needing you. You done yet? Gabrielle wiped some of the tepid broth from her chin and nodded. She ate only because it was expected of her. Raz took the key from his pocket and unlocked the manacles. Gabrielle rubbed her wrists to restore circulation, then falteringly, stood.

Here, Raz said and held the dress to her. Get ready. He continued to watch as the girl dropped the shift to the floor and began to change. The dress was covered with cheap lace and satin bows, feminine in a little girl way, with the exception of the bare back it exposed. Gabrielle buckled the scuffed black patent leather shoes. She washed her face in a basin of cold water and then took a brush from her captor and ran it through her hair. When her preparations were through, she meekly took Raz’s hand.

I’m ready, she said.

As they walked through the basement and up the rickety steps, Reverend Toland once again thanked the Lord for the miracle and the burden that had been given him.

* * * * *

The congregation had swollen to huge proportions. The First Church of the Blessed Angel shook to the foundation with sounds of praise. Gospel songs, as lacking in pitch as they were rich with sincerity, thundered to the heavens. The heavens responded by unleashing a downpour of rain mixed with hailstones that banged upon the tin roof and threatened to shatter the ancient windows.

The prayer meeting was well under way. Nellie Claremont banged away at the out-of-tune piano, each torturous note sending jolts of pain through her joints. Rita Halliway, already possessed by The Holy Spirit, was frothing in the aisle, speaking in a tongue no one understood. Big Jim Tucker, full of God and gin, testified at the top of his lungs. Tears streamed down his unshaven cheeks as he told of his past life of sin when he drove big rigs on cross-country trips.

Reverend Toland stood by the pew and tapped his leather bound Bible in uncertain time with the music. His wife April stood by a tattered red curtain that surrounded the small platform behind him. He glanced at her and she nodded that everything was ready. He smiled and turned back to the congregation as Bringing in the Sheaves came to a disharmonious close.

Amen, Brethren. Praise the Lord-uh, he shouted out in his best Sunday voice. Those of his flock who were still conscious returned a resounding Amen!

Thank you all for coming here this evening, Raz continued. "It is time once more to renew our pact with God. To see his miracle and receive. . . a healing. To bind the evil to the earth once more and be lifted on the wings of spirit.

Come now, Raz invited, those who need to be healed. The sick and the infirm of the audience began to line up in the aisle. Time to witness the Holy Miracle, our church’s Blessed Angel. He nodded once more to April and she pulled the curtain away.

Gabrielle stood revealed on the platform and the church was silent except for the sounds of the storm. In the weak light of the building she was luminescent and serene. Her face, the picture of unearthly innocence, stared out over the congregation. She walked slowly to the front of the pulpit, and in a voice young yet ageless asked, Who needs to be healed?

Stephanie does, Holy One. Abigail Molnar’s head was bowed in awe and supplication as she stepped forward carrying her six-year-old daughter. She broke her arm two days ago. Unh. . . She shot a sideways glance at her husband Ed. She, um, fell off the porch. . . accidentally.

Stephanie was pale and fevered. Gabrielle pulled the wrapping away from the broken arm and saw the dried blood where the bone fragment still stuck through the skin. The girl’s hand rested at an unnatural angle.

We was waitin’ to see you, Abigail explained. Ed don’t trust the doctors down at the big town. We knew you could help.

Gabrielle placed her hands upon Stephanie’s arm and closed her eyes. Silence filled the church, and even the rain seemed to pause in bated anticipation. A warm blue glow began to emanate from Gabrielle’s hands, then to surround her body and suffuse the building with its comforting light. Stephanie’s fever dropped as her arm resumed its original shape and the bones began to knit together. Though they had witnessed this kind of miracle many times before, a gasp swept through the audience.

It was then the true miracle occurred. As Gabrielle performed the healing, she felt a familiar itch in her shoulder blades. As the congregation watched, a pair of large, virgin white wings erupted from her back and spread around her.

Reverend Toland smiled as he watched the angel he had inherited from his father, and from his father before that. The storm dimmed as the healing went on well into the night.

* * * * *

In a chamber deep within the stony heart of the mountains that surrounded Canaan, another being howled its agony, as its chains grew tighter.

scratch scratch

Flecks of rust from the tight iron chains around his wrists become imbedded under his nails. Claw-like fingers scrape moss from the cold stone wall. Contact with the rock sends skittering vibrations through his arms. In the dark of the mountain, eyes stare in anger and pain in the dim unnatural illumination.

scratch scratch

He was trapped here in this deep, deep hole, trapped for generations by the same pact that held Gabrielle captive in the town in the valley. They were chained together as surely as he was chained to this damp stone slab in the dark interior of the mountain.

The people of Canaan called the creature Scratch. It was not his true name anymore than Gabrielle was the true name of his sister. He moaned deep in his chest. The chains went slack once more as he gave up a struggle he knew was futile. He sat on the corner of his stony bed and leaned his back against the moist wall of the cavern. His right arm lay at a twisted angle at his side, a bone sticking through the flesh. It would be fine in a day or two, sooner if he fed, but for now Scratch bore the pain that Gabrielle had removed from the little girl, as he had borne the pain of every healing she had performed in Canaan for a century now.

He closed his eyes and took a slow breath to relax. His body was trapped here, true, but his spirit was unbound. In this way he was freer than Gabrielle had ever been. It was a secret that no one in the town had ever known, although they all felt his presence, scratching at the loose parts of their minds.

Scratch’s consciousness uncoiled from the nest of his brain, slithering through the soft pink folds, and then emerged from his eyes. It hung for a moment, invisible in the dim light. He saw his body, slack against the cavern wall, and then turned away. The night was young, and he needed to feed.

He slid along the air currents that breathed through the caverns, crawling through the passages and wormholes that riddled the mountain. Natural caves led to mine shafts, abandoned long ago when the rich anthracite played out. He passed through the white-hot fires of the burning shaft, then began to climb higher toward the cool breezes that seeped in from the night outside.

Scratch paused briefly in a chamber filled with the bones of miners trapped by a cave-in in 1937. He had been here then, feeding on their fear as they slowly starved and went mad. He had been sated for weeks, enough to barely notice the injuries Gabrielle healed and sent his way. He licked the bones now, tasting the residue of terror that still clung to them like old dust, an appetizer for the night ahead. He moved on then, slipping easily through passages that had been too small for the miners.

The shafts became wider as he approached the surface. Rotting wood timbers, broken in places, shored up the weight of the mountain. A wall of twisted boards blocked the entrance to a side chamber. Scratch drifted through the small fissures between the slats. He then breathed deeply of the air of the Boneyard.

The old miners had not called it that: the men who had filled it over the years had named the Boneyard. The room was full of makeshift graves, packed with the bodies of people who had come too close to the secret of Canaan. Outsiders who had seen Gabrielle were buried and hidden in the mountain like Scratch himself. The chamber was painted with the fear of their last moments, trimmed with the guilt and shame of those who put them here.

Scratch drank, and then moved on. He crawled through a boarded up hole in the side of the mountain and slithered along the floor of the forest, staying to the lowest places. The noises of the night went still in his wake. He passed over rocks and roots, and rode the currents of small streams down into the valley. He skimmed across the stagnant water that filled the old quarry. Secrets were held in its muddy depths; secrets like the bloodstained hammer. He tasted the alcohol vapors of Jack Hardy’s still where the sweetest murder had taken place oh so long ago, then turned onto the well-worn path that led back to Jack’s house.

Jack was still awake, sitting in the porch swing where he had first kissed his best friend’s wife. It had been a long time since Jack had gone to sleep early. Even longer since he had slept well. His guilt was buried deeper than the men he had helped put in the Boneyard, too deep for Scratch to feed upon now. It had been over forty years since Jack had committed murder. Oh, Jack had done what was necessary to protect the secret of Canaan, but his role these days was limited to hiding evidence and keeping his mouth shut, and he was good at that… very good. But the old shame was still there, a memory that time wouldn’t heal, and the demon would scratch at it

scratch scratch

until it bled, as raw as the day it happened. The old wounds, provided they were deep enough, were the most nourishing. Scratch licked at the scab of memory, a promise that he would return later, when Jack was asleep.

When the nightmares came again.

Scratch fled over the hillside, past the empty Porter house and onto the dirt road that led to Canaan. He came to the Molnar trailer and slipped in through the same holes as the rats and bugs. Stephanie was asleep, curled in the protective arch of her mother’s body. There were no scars on her arm where the bone had torn the skin. Scratch knew the scars ran deeper.

Abigail clutched her child tightly to her chest and wept. Ed was still working in the garage. She prayed he would stay there until she was asleep, and that he wouldn’t wake her when he did come in. He was angry. He was always angry, but more so tonight. On the way home from church and the healing he had yelled at her for embarrassing him in front of the whole town. Maybe he did lose his temper and hurt Stephanie, but no one needed to know that. That was what Gabrielle was for, anyway. Abby thought she was safe from his fists for at least a little while. Bruises on either her or Steffie would look bad to everyone right now, and Ed knew it. Still, she hoped he would stay away. She was safe from his fists but not from his cock, which only seemed hard if he was hurting her. At least that didn’t take long.

Scratch ran his tongue over her cheeks and shook with the pleasure her tears contained. Abby felt a chill climb the trunk of her spine. Scratch slunk back down to the floor. It was time to visit Ed.

The garage smelled of burnt oil, beer, and sweat. Ed lay on his back on a mechanic’s cart under a 1984 Buick. As he worked at a stubborn alternator bolt, the ratchet handle slipped and tore into his flesh just under the blue tattoo that read Stephanie. Blood erupted on his hand, the same hand that had pushed her off the porch two days ago. It dripped on his grease-dotted face. His teeth clenched in an angry grimace as he pulled on the wrench.

Scratch crawled across the floor of the garage. Its boards were black with the oil of years. He slid under the car next to Ed in a shower of rust flecks. Ed’s rage was a buffet for Scratch. It emanated from someplace deep and dark within him. Ed was mad at the car, and at Abigail, but they were just convenient targets for the fury of a lifetime. Scratch had been there when Ed’s father was beating the violence into him, insuring he would always be a small and bitter man.

Ed was one of Scratch’s favorites. His emotions were raw and close to the surface where they were easy to feed upon. Sometimes, Scratch could grab Ed by his anger and lead him like a dog upon a leash. The strain was terrible, but the rewards were enormous. Scratch couldn’t make Ed do things, but he could influence him.

scratch scratch

She thinks you’re a loser, Scratch whispered into Ed’s ear, and Ed heard it as his own thoughts. She thinks your dick is tiny. She thinks you’re stupid, just like your daddy did. Did you know she laughs at you with her friends?

Fuckin’ Bitch! Ed threw the wrench across the garage. Scratch smiled and left Ed’s side. He would be back in time for the rape. Ed’s anger and Abby’s fear and shame would make a delicious dessert. Stephanie’s terror when she woke on the rocking bed would be even better.

Out of the garage and down the hollow into the valley Scratch crawled, until he came to town. Canaan was the postcard image of a picturesque rural village. Small houses, most with their lights out, lined the two streets. A general store and a laundromat, the only two businesses in town, faced each other across the only intersection. A footbridge crossed the small stream that led to the front yard of the First Church of the Blessed Angel and the parsonage that sat next to it.

Scratch glanced around the community, not sure where to begin. There were so many guilty secrets to dine upon. He took his meals piece-by-piece, in every house in town.

Rita Halliwell glanced out of her bedroom window and smiled smugly. The light was still on in Big Jim Tucker’s apartment over the store, like it was every Wednesday after the healing service while the Reverend was still busy with Gabrielle. She dropped the curtain and sat down on the edge of her bed. Rita knew everything that went on in Canaan, or at least believed she did. If secrets were nuts and she was a squirrel she would be well stocked for an ice age. As Canaan’s self-appointed guardian of morality she minded everyone’s business but her own. She would plant seeds of gossip in the appropriate ears, then sit back and watch the results.

And though he feasted on her store of pride nightly, she didn’t know about Scratch.

scratch scratch

Nellie Claremont struggled with the cap on the bottle of Wild Turkey. Her thin fingers, gnarled and swollen with arthritis, were unable to get a good grip. If only she could have a drink or two, just for the pain mind you, she would be able to sleep. The pain was the only thing she had slept with since her husband was buried in the 1937 cave-in. She had been Mrs. Theodore Claremont for less than six months, and the Widow Claremont for over sixty years. Tears filled the crevices around her eyes as she tried to open the bottle. Even Gabrielle’s healing hands did not help the pain for long. A few hours at most, long enough to play the piano for the service. Then, the ache would return. Maybe tomorrow she could get Jim to open the bottle for her. Tonight she would have to make due with the cough syrup, or the vanilla, or maybe there was some of Jack’s homemade brew left in that bottle secreted in the trash.

Just for the pain, mind you.

scratch scratch

Big Jim Tucker came with a grunt and a convulsion. When his eyes were able to focus again, he smiled at April Toland, the reverend’s wife, good and true, lying beneath his bulk. She smiled back, eyes as always filled with a mixture of pleasure and shame. She knew this was a sin, but Raz wasn’t interested in her physically, and a woman had needs whether the servant of God did or not. And she wanted a baby. If she could get Raz to make love to her just one more time she would go off the birth control and get pregnant. Even if it were Jim’s, no one else needed to know. She ran her fingertips along his broad chest and down to the tangle of wet pubic hair. With a slight touch he began to stir again.

Everyone called him Big Jim. They had no idea. April dove headlong into her lust and straddled him again. Raz would only be with Gabrielle for a little while longer.

scratch scratch

Scratch glanced over Jim briefly. He was a disappointment. His past was filled with sin and murder. His days on the road had left a path of blood and suffering. He had settled in Canaan finally because it was a good place to hide, and had quickly shared in the crimes of the community. But there was no nourishment for Scratch in Big Jim Tucker. He could find no guilt or shame hidden in the man.

scratch scratch

Shelley Tanner smoked at her bedroom window in the parsonage where the tobacco fumes could meld with the night air. There were still lights in the church and in Jim’s apartment, where she knew her sister was. Anger and jealousy coursed through her eighteen-year-old mind. She loved Jim, and he had to love her too, didn’t he? They hadn’t gone all the way yet, but she had given him a blowjob in the backroom of the store right before her work shift this afternoon. Shelley knew April was having an affair with him, but that couldn’t last. Shelley was younger, and prettier, and soon she would know all the things that pleased a man that her prig of an older sister couldn’t possibly know.

If she told Raz about the affair, it would be over now. Shelley went to bed, satisfied that she had a secret to hold over people. She would get what she wanted, eventually.

scratch scratch

The rest of Canaan had delicacies for Scratch as well; the Moore brothers, eleven and thirteen, had tortured and killed a cat this afternoon, and tonight the adrenaline-fueled joy had turned to guilt.

scratch scratch

Eight-year-old Emily Tennant cried herself to sleep, awash in loss and grief after finding her kitten Socks nailed to a tree in the back yard.

scratch scratch

Pete Sutter cheated at cards – scratch scratch – Mary McDougal, left eye swollen shut, checked her hidden stash of money to see if there was enough to escape yet – scratch scratch – Sam McDougal slept peacefully – scratch scratch – Larry Miller read the paper, hand red and sore from the punishment Larry Jr. had deserved – scratch scratch – Larry Jr. wept in his bed and vowed that when he was big enough the old man was gonna pay.

scratch scratch

And on into the night Scratch fed.

He slid across the churchyard and crossed the glowing circle that only his eyes could see. A ring of blue fire, placed there by the man who had bound them, surrounded the church, invisibly defining the limits of Gabrielle’s prison.

He passed Raz on the steps of the church, and barely paused. Raz, like his fathers before him, was full of the self-righteous belief that God ordained what he did. The angel had been sent into his care for the good of the community, and keeping her imprisoned was the natural course of things. This kept the demon captive as well. As if Scratch and Gabrielle had any connection to his God. They were far older than his conceptions of good and evil, and had been in this land long before his people had brought their beliefs here. The older people of this land, gone now, had their own names for the spirit people. Names that were not their true names either.

Though full of the same belief, Raz was not full of the same power his ancestors carried. His great-grandfather, Lars Toland, had been born with magic in his veins, the same magic that medicine men and shamans had carried all over the world since time began. Though Lars believed this power came from his god, it still allowed him to learn the true names of two spirit beings and to chain them to his will.

Raz knew the true names; he had inherited that information along with the rest of the knowledge needed to perform his duty. He had the responsibility, but lacked the power.

Scratch crept along the worn gray carpet of the church, passing under the pews. He slunk down the steps and under the locked door and gazed upon his sister. Gabrielle, small and fragile, was asleep, unaware that the chains around her wrists were not her natural state. She didn’t know she wasn’t free. Her unawareness was part of the pact that bound them, a blessing to her.

Scratch did know, and that was part of his curse.

He kissed her lightly on her cheek, and then left the room quickly. Jack had finally fallen asleep and begun to dream. Scratch could also feel Ed’s anger and Stephanie’s fear. The rape was about to begin.

PART ONE:

UPS and DOWNS

CHAPTER ONE

On the Thursday afternoon that Adam Mansfield punched his boss in the nose and lost his job, no one was more surprised than Adam himself. The last time he had hit somebody had been in the fifth grade and the subsequent ass kicking he received had dissuaded him from ever resorting to violence again.

Until now, that is.

He didn’t plan to hit Kevin Jones, and even as his arm shot forward he wondered what was happening. A horrified part of himself watched as Jones’ head snapped back. Blood sprayed the room in thick globules, and Adam could feel its wet heat on his knuckles. A shockwave from the impact traveled slowly up his arm. There was the visceral knowledge that something had broken under his fist, and the cerebral knowledge that his career and everything he had worked for was over.

The teens he counseled were all in the Common Room of the Youth Center. Was it just last week that Derrick had punched Tammy in the forehead? Derrick had been kicked out of the group home and sent back to the juvenile lockup facility. How many times had Adam talked to him about more appropriate ways to deal with anger? Now the others, including Tammy, who still had a thick, purple knot between her eyes, would know that Adam was just like them. Full of rage that eventually had to escape.

Adam was an idealist. He was naturally empathetic, and a good listener. In the five years since he completed his Master’s degree in Social Work he had counseled a wide range of clients. He spent two years in a group home for retarded adults, and another with the mentally ill. During that time he had worked part time, summers and weekends, with a program for disadvantaged adolescents. This job, the one he wouldn’t have at the end of the day, was working with inner city kids in Pittsburgh. They were all adjudicated delinquents who had been thrown into the system after some sort of crime, mostly drug related.

Adam had flourished in all of these jobs. He was always the most popular counselor, the one the clients would open up to when they wouldn’t talk to anyone else. He had had great success with a number of his charges, convincing them that there were always options other than violence or acting out. The irony was clear to him even as he watched Mr. Jones falling backward out of his swivel chair.

The same idealism that made him a hit with his clients caused him problems in other areas. Adam’s tolerance for red tape and bureaucracy was extremely low. He believed in doing what was right for the client under any circumstances, and at times that conflicted with the rules. The anger that had crawled out of his gut and through his arm into Jones’s face was not entirely new. He wasn’t even completely unaware of it. He felt it every time the budget got in the way of something his clients needed. Every time the paperwork came first. Every time office politics got in the way of doing the work that was paramount to him. Those things happened far too frequently for Adam. They happened all the time.

Mr. Jones was an arrogant man of very little ability when it came to relating to the adolescents who passed through his doors. He was didactic, and forceful, and invoked his authority frequently, especially when it helped cover his complete lack of empathy or aptitude. Adam had clashed with him since day one. Today, during a routine staffing, they argued again about the ridiculous amount of paperwork that was required. Adam’s contention was that most of it was repetitive and unnecessary, and most importantly, took time away from working directly with the kids who needed him.

Then, just thirty seconds ago, Jones told Adam that it didn’t really matter if he actually treated his clients or not, as long as the paperwork was in order. He was just beginning to say that they were mostly lost causes anyway when his nose was broken. He registered the surprised look on Adam’s face even as his head snapped back and hit the wall and the chair began to topple over.

Dan and Monica, the other counselors present at the staffing, gaped in surprise, then jumped from their chairs. Dan, a thin,