The Veil: The Veil, #1

By Jason Wrench

When Jensen Kripke learns of his twin brother's mauling death, he knows the coroner's report sounds fishy. To learn the truth behind his brother's death, Jensen enrolls at Smithfield College and quickly finds himself steeped in a world of Christian mysticism, religions beyond his reference point, and supernatural powers vying to take control of the campus. Smithfield College, and its protectors, attempt to keep the veil between the supernatural and natural worlds in-check, but when a third party enters the picture determined to bring the veil crumbling to the ground, Jensen must join forces with the most unlikely group before the dark forces succeed and the veil is left in tatters permanently.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Jason Wrench
• Release date: Jan 20, 2021
• ISBN: 9781393133803

Jason Wrench

Jason Wrench was born in San Jose, CA, grew up in Lubbock, TX, got his doctorate in Morgantown, WV, and now lives in Rosendale, NY. He is a Professor in the Department of Communication at the State University of New York at New Paltz. He’s been teaching in higher education for over 20 years. He’s worked at Texas Tech University, West Virginia University, West Virginia School of Osteopathic Medicine, Ohio University, Indiana State University, Excelsior College, and SUNY New Paltz. Jason loves Broadway, Coffee, and his Puggles. He’s also published many books and research articles under his professional name, Jason S. Wrench (that middle initial makes all the difference in the world). Find him on: Facebook: https://tinyurl.com/y2bqxlnh Twitter: https://twitter.com/JWrenchAuthor Website: https://JasonWrench.com Newsletter: https://sendfox.com/lp/1d5z8k

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Epigraph

There was a door to which I found no key: There was the veil through which I might not see.

—Omar Khayyam

There was the Door to which I found no key; There was the Veil through which I might see.

—Edward Fitzgerald

PROLOGUE

The rabbit goes around the tree and through the hole . Jared Kripke always remembered the verse his mother repeated to him as he was learning to tie his shoes. As he was putting on his running shoes for a 7 o’clock run, the sound of this mother’s voice was echoing in his ears. While Jared’s mother had died when he was only seven years old, he could still hear her voice each time he laced-up his shoes. Jared was now 18 years old and on a full-ride to Smithkill College in Upstate New York about 20 miles southwest of Albany.

Smithkill College had been founded in 1868 as a training ground for military officers during the Civil War. Once the war was finished, the college took on a more traditional liberal arts curriculum. The college was always more progressive. Smithkill was one of the first comprehensive schools to allow women to attend classes shortly after the Civil War.

The modern campus was built around the original handful of buildings that included a chapel, Bell Tower, dormitory, and officer’s quarters, serving as the Administration Building and various faculty offices. The cornerstones of the original four buildings were lain to create a perfect square representing the world’s four corners. Each of the cornerstones was placed precisely 400 yards from the other cornerstones. In the middle, the green grass had initially been used for various drills, but today was the home of a grassy area known to Smithkill College students as The Quad. The precision the campus’s original designers used to ensure everything was perfectly symmetrical and precisely aligned with the north and south poles led many conspiracy theorists to wonder if the architects had a supernatural agenda. Although the chief architect of Smithkill was a known Mason, there was no real reason to suspect that the Masons had anything to do with the creation of the college. Still, many conspiracies were passed from one generation of students to the next.

Jared lived in a two-story dormitory about 200 yards from The Quad. Palmer House was named after Sarah Palmer Young, a Civil War nurse and hero who had lived in Upstate New York before the war. Palmer Young was a well-known Civil War nurse commonly referred to as Aunt Becky. In the late 1800s, Palmer Young wrote a book about her experience as a Civil War nurse, which ultimately led Smithkill College to name a building after her.

Jared’s room had a direct line of sight to The Quad, so he would often sit at his computer desk watching people playing football or Frisbee when the weather was nice. Jared knew the last of the lovely weather days were quickly evaporating. Once November hits Upstate New York, only the gods could predict what the weather would do. Some years the weather would be peaceful all the way through December, but other years Smithkill would have 8 to 12 inches of snow for Halloween. This Halloween, however, the gods had kept the sky clear with a hint of winter crispness in the air. Jared predicted that he had only a couple more good jogging weeks before he would be forced to take shelter in the campus gym running on a treadmill.

Jared was finishing getting ready when his roommate Dani Rifkin, or Rif, as his friends called him, came stumbling into the room. Rif wasn’t exactly drunk, but he clearly enjoyed his Halloween festivities.

Dude, you totally should have come out with us tonight! The Dive had a great special on some homemade pumpkin ale. That stuff was wicked strong. I swear, I think I did some permanent damage, Rif said as he was kicking off of his shoes. Rif turned and plopped down on his bed.

Rif, trust me, I’d much rather have gone with you and the guys to The Dive than sit in my dorm room on Halloween Night studying for a chemistry midterm. Unfortunately, I don’t think Dr. Patel celebrates any holidays in whatever country he came from. Dr. Patel was notorious for giving tests right before or right after major holidays. Students often felt that taking Patel meant not having a Fall or Spring Break. Patel would make sure there was a killer test on the Monday students got back from vacation.

Jared grabbed his ball cap and was about ready to walk out the door, but thought he’d try to invite Rif to go jogging one more time. Hey Rif, you sure you don’t want to go for a late-night jog with me finally?! Jared had been trying to get Rif to go jogging since they first met as roommates back in August. Rif wasn’t exactly out-of-shape, but he wasn’t exactly the model of collegiate health either.

Dude, as I’ve told you before. Philosophically, I am against the idea of running in any capacity. The only time I think humans should run is when they’re being chased by wild animals. Frankly, I don’t think you’re going to find any mountain lions or bears running around campus waiting for my fat ass to chase. Jared chuckled at the mental picture he drew of Rif being chased by wild lions through The Quad. Hey, don’t laugh!! It takes a lot of work to look this good. And by work, I mean beer and sleep.

On that note, I’ll leave you to your rest, sleeping beauty. Before Rif could respond with a comeback, Jared was out the door. Score points for me. I actually got the last word in for a change. Jared walked to the end of the hall, opened the door, and descended the flights of stairs to the outside entrance.

The smell of autumn hit Jared the second he exited the dorm. Jared always enjoyed the scent of fallen leaves combined with the stillness the night air provided him during these rare days before the snow would begin to fall. Jared glanced down at his watch. 11:45. Dear God!! His chemistry midterm was in a little over nine hours, so this was going to have to be a brief run after all.

Jared started running at a moderate pace towards The Quad. He turned on his iPhone and started listening to Barry Harris’ song Let’s Get Soaking Wet. Jared had created a special playlist of fast dance songs to keep him energized while running. By the time the song was ending, Jared was already crossing the street, leaving the Smithkill College Campus.

The town of Smithkill, NY, was a typical college town with one Main Street adorned with various restaurants and shops. While not a number-one tourist destination for people, many New York City people had homes in the surrounding area that they would flee to on the weekends or holidays. To the college students, Smithkill consisted of three types of people: students, townies, and citidiots. Anyone associated with the college was considered part of the college, so those individuals were not real townies. Townies lived in Smithkill for most of their lives and continued to live there despite a lack of jobs not associated with the college. At least once or twice a year, the town cops and the campus cops would have to intervene between the students and some teenage townies wanting to fight. The townies saw the students as parasites who did more harm for the town than good. Sadly, without the college, Smithkill probably would have ceased to exist at the turn of the 20th Century. The last class of people was the citidiots. The citidots were the people who came up to the area from NYC on the weekends. Citidiots would clog the streets on the weekends, were not actively engaged in the community, and were a general nuisance to both the townies and the students. The only positive thing about citidiots was that they had lots of expendable income and purchased weekend/vacation homes in the area. Without citidiots, the realty market would be very stagnant. The extra dose of property taxes didn’t hurt the town either.

Jared crossed over and ran down Main Street towards Smithkill Park. The jog would give him an excellent three-mile run overall. On the opposite side of the street, Jared could see people still milling around inside The Dive. A couple of drunk coeds were puking on the side of the building, still wearing their Halloween costumes. Jared chuckled to himself as he watched a 20-something female dressed up as a French maid throwing-up all over some poor guy’s car. He could hear the guy yelling at her over the iPhone’s music. Instead of sticking around to watch the drama unfold, Jared picked up the pace and kept heading towards Smithkill Park.

After 10 minutes of running, Jared was hitting his ideal heart rate. As an avid runner, Jared knew precisely how hard to push himself to get an optimal workout. While running, Jared started going over his chemistry notes in his head. Common plastics are a combination of polymers of carbon and hydrogen blah blah blah. Jared wondered how these useless facts would ultimately help him in the real world when he finished college. As a political science major, knowing the chemical components of plastic wouldn’t help him get elected to public office.

Jared passed several small stores as he was running. There was a furniture store that catered to the citidiots who had way too much money to spend. Most of the store’s inventory could be purchased from IKEA for a fraction of the cost. Still, the citidiots loved to show that they had expendable income and could afford to be eccentric and buy a $1,000 chair.

Up on the right, Jared noticed the Dahomean Bookstore. The Dahomean Bookstore was the local esoteric bookstore that catered to a wide range of individuals. Wiccans, pagans, shamans, and a whole host of individuals into the occult could find a range of books and supplies. While Jared was a skeptic of the whole supernatural thing, he’d interviewed the bookstore owner for a class project many weeks earlier. The owner of the Dahomean Bookstore was a blind, black man around 70 years old named Darren Pritchard. Pritchard had a wide range of ideas about the supernatural that Jared found interesting, albeit definitely farfetched.

A sudden, shattering crack, and Jared stared at the sidewalk flattened against the ground. At first, he thought he had tripped, but the front window of the Dahomean Bookstore was still coming down on him. The ringing in his head reminded him of the first time he heard a shotgun go off when he’d gone hunting as a child with his father. Jared picked himself up, still shell-shocked from the blast that had thrown him to the ground. He checked out his body to make sure he was ok. A few shards of glass had cut him on his legs and arms, but nothing was life-threatening. Jared peeked inside the store, expecting to see flames or some other indication of a violent explosion.

The inside of the Dahomean Bookstore appeared still, quiet. Jared’s hearing was returning to him, and the one thing he noticed was the sheer deafening silence of the evening. Jared didn’t hear any birds, traffic, or other natural forms of sound in the vicinity. He blinked his eyes a few times and rubbed his ears, hoping to regain more of his hearing, but there was still silence. Jared climbed in through the missing window to make sure no one was injured.

Mr. Pritchard, are you here? Anyone here? If you can’t talk, bang on something so I can find you. Jared barely heard his own voice through the ringing in his ears. He waited a few moments and didn’t hear a response. The store was in complete disarray. Again, Jared expected to see signs of what caused the window to shatter outward and hit him as he was running by. Still, there was no sign that there was anything that could have caused that kind of force. Strewn around the room were books that once lined the store’s shelves. The room almost looked like a burst of wind had ripped through the room like a mini-tornado. As Jared’s eyes started adjusting to the dark, he noticed something body-shaped behind an overturned bookshelf. He cleared a path, overturning a table and removing another fallen bookshelf to approach the figure.

Mr. Pritchard? Jared reached out and touched the figure. At that moment, Jared noticed two things about the figure. First, he smelled the figure. The decaying smell was something Jared had never experienced before; a combination of dirt and rot. Second, he felt the strength of the creature as it bowled him over and started beating on his chest with all its might. Jared kicked hard and got the thing off of him. In the dark, Jared couldn’t figure out what the animal was, but he knew the animal was crazy-strong.

Jared quickly scrambled to his feet. He glanced around, and he couldn’t see the animal anywhere. Jared carefully made his way back to the front window. He kept his eye on the store as he climbed back through the window—still nothing. Whatever attacked Jared in the room was hiding and doing it very well. Damn, why did I leave my cell phone in the room? Jared looked one last time at the fallen glass and turned to run back towards The Dive to get help.

One-hundred yards in front of Jared was the creature snarling in his direction. OK, not going in that direction.

Jared spun around in place and ran at full tilt toward Smithkill Park. Jared knew the park was filled with police call boxes marked with blue lights. A few years earlier, the phone boxes had been installed after a female student had been attacked in the park. The general thought was the boxes could be helpful if one needed the police immediately.

Jared crossed the street and started running towards the closest police call box. He was 25 feet away from the call box when he tasted dirt. Only when he felt the grass beneath his head did he realize he was screaming. Jared stared to the left and saw multiple legs around his body. He felt claws ripping through his shirt and penetrating his skin. He closed his eyes, and after a few moments, the pain disappeared. A moment comes right before death when the pain evaporates, and the body’s senses cannot all communicate with the brain. Hence, the brain stops processing the pain.

Snap. Jared heard the sound of his neck breaking. It wasn’t the sound of a twig breaking or a pencil breaking; the sound was definitely unique.

CHAPTER ONE

The Jeep Compass riding through the wrought-iron gates of Smithkill College barely caused anyone to look up from what they were doing. The driver had only been to Smithkill College once before when he had traveled with his brother to visit the school when they were both high school seniors.

Jensen observed at the pristine campus as he navigated his way to the Palmer House parking lot. Snow covered the bulk of the campus. The only displacement of snow came in the form of cleared off parking lots and sidewalks and the occasional human footprint or track from some other animal type. Jensen navigated his Jeep into an available parking space, turned off the engine, and slowly climbed out. The briskness of the January cold quickly bit at his face. God, why hadn’t Jared chosen a lovely warm state to go to college? Jensen reached into the back seat of the Jeep and grabbed both his winter coat and a manila folder containing his housing information and class schedule.

Jared and Jensen were supposed to start school at Smithkill College together. Still, Jensen decided he wanted to go backpacking through Europe instead. He tried to convince Jared putting off school for a year wasn’t big a deal, but Jared had his life planned out already. Jared wanted to finish his political science degree, get into an excellent law school, find a good clerkship with a federal judge, become a district attorney, and run for state representative. Jensen had heard Jared’s master plan so many times he could rattle it off from memory. Jared had his entire life mapped out when he was a freshman in high school. Jensen was the rebellious type, wanting to live life to its fullest, simply seeing where it took him.

Jensen’s parents spent two weeks trying to track him down in Europe after Jared’s death. Jensen altered his original itinerary because he’d made friends with some Finnish kids in Amsterdam, so he stayed in Amsterdam longer than he predicted. By the time they had tracked Jensen down, Jared’s funeral had already occurred. Jensen caught the first flight back to the states when his parents finally found him in Rome’s youth hostel. Of course, the flight happened after his fist went through at least one door, and he threw a soda machine out a third-story window.

When Jensen got back to the US and started asking questions, something didn’t seem right about the whole situation. First, the body had been totally mutilated. Yet, there had been no other attacks, before or after. Any expert hunter could tell you if a