Shadows

  PRAISE FOR

  SHADOWS

  “Saul gives us another tightly crafted horrorfest in Shadows. But unlike the other horrormasters, Stephen King and Dean Koontz, Saul’s books race to a heartwrenching conclusion.… Great stuff, you won’t want to miss this one.”

  —UPI

  ♦

  “John Saul’s Shadows is his best book.… This is a fast and frightening read.”

  —Rocky Mountain News

  ♦

  “One of the masters of the genre … John Saul crafts a credible and suspenseful tale.… The denouement is chilling.”

  —The Atlanta Journal

  ♦

  “Saul has written a tale with surprising twists and a full cast of characters, some delightfully malevolent.… Saul’s fans will no doubt savor this latest offering.”

  —The Seattle Times

  ♦

  “Saul … delivers a tense, high-tech psychological suspense thriller … [with] a delightful final twist.”

  —Publishers Weekly

  ♦

  “The best of any horror novel (or any other kind, for that matter) to arrive this season.”

  —The Press-Enterprise, Riverside, CA

  a cognizant original v5 release november 24 2010

  By John Saul:

  SUFFER THE CHILDREN***

  PUNISH THE SINNERS***

  CRY FOR THE STRANGERS***

  COMES THE BLIND FURY***

  WHEN THE WIND BLOWS***

  THE GOD PROJECT*

  NATHANIEL*

  BRAINCHILD*

  HELLFIRE*

  THE UNWANTED*

  THE UNLOVED*

  CREATURE*

  SECOND CHILD*

  SLEEPWALK*

  DARKNESS*

  SHADOWS*

  GUARDIAN*

  THE HOMING*

  BLACK LIGHTNING*

  THE BLACKSTONE CHRONICLES:

  Part 1—AN EYE FOR AN EYE: THE DOLL** Part 2—TWIST OF FATE: THE LOCKET**

  Part 3—ASHES TO ASHES:

  THE DRAGON’S FLAME**

  Part 4—IN THE SHADOW OF EVIL:.

  THE HANDKERCHIEF**

  Part 5—DAY OF RECKONING:

  THE STEREOSCOPE**

  Part 6—ASYLUM**

  THE PRESENCE**

  THE RIGHT HAND OF EVIL**

  And now available

  John Saul’s latest tale of terror

  NIGHTSHADE

  * Published by Bantam Books

  ** Published by the Ballantine Publishing Group

  *** Published by Dell Books

  This edition contains the complete text of the original hardcover edition.

  NOT ONE WORD HAS BEEN OMITTED.

  SHADOWS

  A Bantam Book

  PUBLISHING HISTORY

  Bantam hardcover edition published July 1992

  Bantam paperback edition I June 1993

  All rights reserved.

  Copyright © 1992 by John Saul

  Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 92-1317.

  No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any

  form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including

  photocopying recording or by any information storage and

  retrieval system, without permission in writing

  from the publisher.

  For information address: Bantam Books.

  eISBN: 978-0-307-76802-5

  Bantam Books are published by Bantam Books, a division of Random House, Inc. Its trademark, consisting of the words “Bantam Books” and the portrayal of a rooster, is Registered in U.S. Patent and Trademark Office and in other countries. Marca Registrada. Bantam Books, 1540 Broadway, New York, New York 10036.

  v3.1

  For all my friends on Lopez Island

  And especially:

  Larry and Rita

  Ron and Jennifer

  Robert and Christopher

  Jon and Barb

  And—last, but certainly not least—

  TA.

  CONTENTS

  Cover

  Other Books by This Author

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Epilogue

  About the Author

  PROLOGUE

  Shadows.

  Timmy Evans woke up in shadows.

  Shadows so deep he saw nothing.

  Shadows that surrounded Timmy, wrapping him in a blackness so dense that he wondered if the vague memory of light that hovered on the edges of his memory was perhaps only a dream.

  Yet Timmy was certain that it was not merely a dream, that there was such a thing as light; that somewhere, far beyond the shadows in which he found himself, there was another world.

  A world, he was suddenly certain, of which he was no longer a part.

  He had no idea what time it was, nor what day, nor even what year.

  Was it day, or night?

  He had no way of knowing.

  Tentatively, the first tendrils of panic already beginning to curl themselves around him, Timmy began exploring the blackness of his shadowed world, tried to reach out into the darkness.

  He could feel nothing.

  It was almost as if his fingers themselves were gone.

  He put his hands together.

  Instead of the expected warmth of one palm pressed firmly against the other, there was nothing.

  No feeling at all.

  The tendrils of panic grew stronger, twisting around Timmy Evans like the tentacles of a giant octopus.

  His mind recoiled from the panic, pulling back, trying to hide from the darkness.

  What had happened?

  Where was he?

  How had he gotten there?

  Instinctively, he began counting.

  “One.”

  “Two.”

  “Three.”

  “Four.”

  The numbers marched through his head, growing ever larger as he listened to the voice in his mind that silently intoned the words that meant the most to him in all the world.

  The same voice he remembered from the suddenly dim past, when there had been light, and sounds other than the voice that whispered the numbers to him in the silence of his mind.

  Even then, before he had awakened in the shadows, only the numbers had truly meant anything to him.

  It had always been that way, ever since he was very small and had lain on his back, staring at an object suspended above his crib.

  The numbers on the blocks hanging from the mobile had meant something to Timmy Evans.

  Though he had been too young to have a word for the mobile itself, the memory of it was clear.

  “One, two, three, four.”

  The object, brightly colored and suspended from the ceiling on a string, turned slowly above him, the voice in his head speaking each numeral as his eyes fastened on it.

  “One, two, three, four.”

  Later
, he’d seen another object, on the wall high above his crib.

  “One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten, eleven, twelve.”

  Timmy Evans had learned to count the numbers as the hands on the clock pointed to them, though he had no idea what the clock was, nor what purpose it served. But he would lie in his crib all day, his eyes fixed on the clock, saying each number as the hand came to it.

  When he’d learned to walk, he’d begun counting his steps, saying each number out loud.

  Counting the steps that led down from the front porch of his parents’ house.

  Counting the cracks in the broken sidewalk that separated his yard from the street.

  Counting the panes in the stained-glass windows when his parents took him to church, the pillars that supported the church’s high ceiling.

  Counting the slats in the Venetian blinds that covered the window of his room at home, and the neat rows of vegetables in the little garden his mother planted in the backyard.

  Counting everything, endless numbers streaming through his mind.

  Numbers that meant something.

  Numbers that meant order.

  Numbers that defined his world.

  The numbers filled his mind, consumed him.

  They were his friends, his toys.

  He put them together and took them apart, examining them in his own mind until he understood exactly how they worked.

  Multiplying them, dividing them, squaring them, and factoring them.

  Even as he’d grown up and begun to talk of other things, the numbers were always there, streaming through his mind.

  Now, in the terrifying darkness into which he’d awakened, he began to play with the numbers once more.

  Timmy began with a million.

  He’d always liked that number.

  A one, with six zeros after it.

  He multiplied it by nine hundred and ninety-nine thousand, nine hundred and ninety-nine.

  Then multiplied the total by nine hundred and ninety-nine thousand, nine hundred and ninety-eight.

  He kept going, the numbers in his head growing ever larger, occupying more and more of his mind.

  And yet the shadows were still there, and though he tried to concentrate only on the numbers, never losing track of the total, the shadows and the silence still closed around him.

  He moved the numbers into the space in the back of his mind where he could keep them going with half his mind, and used the rest of his mind to try once more to figure out where he was, and how he’d gotten into the shadows.

  School.

  He’d been at school before he woke in the shadows.

  A nice school. A school he liked, where the other kids were almost as good at numbers as he was.

  A pretty school, with a big house set on a broad lawn, shaded by the biggest trees Timmy had ever seen.

  Redwood trees.

  He’d never seen trees that big before his parents had brought him to the school.

  Nor had he ever had friends before.

  Friends like himself, who could do things with their brains that other children couldn’t.

  But now something had happened to him.

  What?

  He tried to remember.

  He’d been in his room.

  His room on the third floor.

  He’d been asleep.

  And before that, he’d been crying.

  Crying, because he’d felt homesick, missing his mother and father, and even his little brother, whom he didn’t even really like.

  He’d cried himself to sleep, wondering if everyone was going to tease him the next morning, because he’d burst into tears in the dining-room, and run out, and up the stairs, slamming his door and not letting anyone in all evening.

  Then, sometime in the night, he’d awakened and heard something.

  Heard what?

  Timmy couldn’t remember.

  He concentrated harder, and a memory—so fleeting it was barely there at all—stirred.

  A rattling sound, like the old elevator that went from the first floor all the way up to the fourth floor.

  Then—nothing!

  Until he’d awakened in the shadows.

  Awakened, to find that there was still nothing.

  Once more, he tried to reach out, but his body refused to respond, refused, even, to acknowledge the commands his mind issued.

  Paralyzed!

  His entire body was paralyzed!

  Now the panic that had been entangling him in its grasp gripped him with an irresistible force, and he screamed out.

  Screamed out—silently.

  He tried to scream again, when out of the shadows, lights began to shine. Brilliant lights, in a spectrum of colors he’d never beheld before in his life.

  Sounds, too, burst forth out of the silence that had surrounded him from the moment of his awakening, a cacophony of achromatic chords, layered over with the screeches and cries of the damned souls of Hell.

  The sound built, along with the blazing lights, until Timmy Evans was certain that if it didn’t stop, his eyes would burn away, and his eardrums would burst.

  Crying out once more, he tried to turn his mind away from the sights and sounds that assaulted him, to turn inward, and bury himself among the numbers that still streamed through the far reaches of his consciousness.

  But it was too late.

  He couldn’t find the numbers, couldn’t make sense of the gibberish he found where only a few short seconds ago the order of mathematics had been.

  Then, as the sensory attack built to a crescendo, Timmy Evans knew what was happening to him.

  Just as he realized what was happening, the last moment came.

  The lights struck once more, with an intensity that tore through his brain, and the howling cacophony shattered his weakening mind.

  In a blaze of light, accompanied by the roaring symphony of a thousand freight trains, Timmy Evans died.

  Died, without ever remembering exactly what had happened to him.

  Died, without understanding how or why.

  Died, when he was only eleven years old.

  Died, in a manner so horrible no one would ever be told about it.

  1

  The first day of school was even worse than he’d thought it would be. Part of it was the weather. It was one of those perfect days when any normal ten-year-old boy would rather be outside, poking around in the desert that surrounded Eden, searching for horny toads and blue-bellies, or just watching the vultures circling in the sky, then maybe going to hunt for whatever had died.

  But Josh MacCallum wasn’t a normal ten-year-old, and it didn’t seem as though anyone was ever going to let him forget it.

  Not his mother, who was always bragging about him to her friends, even though she could see him squirming in embarrassment every time she went on about how he’d been slapped.

  Skipped.

  Like it was some kind of terrific thing, something he should be proud of.

  Except it wasn’t neat—it wasn’t neat at all.

  All it meant was that you were some kind of freak, and when you came into the room on the first day—the room where you didn’t know anybody because all the kids you’d gone to school with last year were in another room in another building—they all stared at you, and started whispering and rolling their eyes.

  It had started even before he got to school that morning, when he’d tried to talk to one of the guys who was going to be in his new class.

  “What’s Mrs. Schulze like?” was all he’d said that morning as he’d run into Ethan Roeder on his way out of the ugly little row of apartments they both lived in.

  Ethan had barely glanced at him. “What do you care? All the teachers love you, don’t they?”

  While Josh’s face burned with the rebuff, Ethan yelled to a couple of his friends, then took off without even a backward glance. Josh had struggled to hold back his tears. For one brief moment he’d felt a burning urge to pick up a rock and
throw it at Ethan, but in the end he’d just thrust his hands in his pockets and started trudging by himself through the dusty streets toward the cluster of sun-baked brown buildings that was Eden Consolidated School.

  Eden.

  Even the name of the town was a crock.

  He’d figured out a long time ago that the name of the town was just a publicity stunt, thought up by some developer to fool people into thinking there was something here besides cactus and dirt.

  It was like Greenland, which he’d read was just a big sheet of ice, named Greenland by some long-gone huckster in the hope that people would move there.

  Well, they sure hadn’t moved to Eden, even if it was in California.

  The town looked as lonesome as Josh felt, and as he’d approached the school that morning, he’d thought about just walking on by, and straight out to the freeway five miles across the desert, where he might be able to hitch a ride to somewhere else.

  Los Angeles maybe, where his father was living.

  Or at least had been living the last time Josh had heard from him.

  The urge to keep on walking hadn’t lasted any longer than the urge to throw a rock at Ethan Roeder, though, and Josh had gone into the middle school building, found Mrs. Schulze’s room, and finally gone in.

  It was just like what had happened the last time he’d been skipped.

  He’d stayed outside until the last possible second, and when he finally slipped through the door, hoping to sink unnoticed into a seat in the last row, Mrs. Schulze had spotted him and given him a too-bright smile.

  “Well, here’s our little genius now,” she’d said. Josh cringed at the word, wishing he could disappear through a hole in the floor, but his wish came no closer to coming true than any of the other wishes he’d fervently sent out over the years to whatever powers might be looking after him.

  If there were any powers looking after him, which he’d decided he doubted, despite what they told him in Sunday School every week.

  He’d stared straight ahead as the rest of the kids, all two years older than himself, had turned to gaze at him. He hadn’t had to look at them to know the expressions on their faces.

  They didn’t want him there.

  They didn’t want him getting perfect scores on all the tests, while they could barely answer the questions.

  It hadn’t been so bad until two years ago, the first time he’d been skipped a grade.