Julien Doran had never felt less sure of anything in his life, and he’d hit that edge at a running jump about two weeks and two thousand miles ago. Right around the time he’d turned his back on everything—the shambled remains of his family, career and common sense—at the suggestion of a dead man.

He might still get lucky. He might never make it to the elusive Maudit Falls and instead spend the rest of eternity driving up and down these mountain roads until, eventually, he’d become just another one of the dozens of urban legends the area seemed to collect like burs. They could call him Old Doran. The Fallen Star. Forty-four years of carefully toeing the line distilled down to this one inarguably absurd decision, and told at bedtime to frighten children into obedience. Don’t you know better than to throw your life away on a lie, little one? Do you want to end up like Old Doran? A man who turned down the first role he’d been offered in four years to fly across the country to middle-of-nowhere North Carolina. A man who thought he could open a wound so recently closed, it still wept at the edges. A man who went looking for a monster.

Listen, they’d say. If you listen really closely, you can still hear his voice echoing through the mountains, calling out, What am I doing here? What did I think I could change? Did I miss my turn?

Julien glanced at the GPS on his phone, but it was still caught in an endless limbo of loading, the service having cut out about fifteen minutes ago.

“The town proper is on the other side of the mountain,” the clerk at the last rest stop had told him. A woman with metallic-rose eyeshadow, a name tag that said Chloe and the unmoving smile of someone sick of delivering the same canned dialogue to every wide-eyed, monster-hunting tourist who passed through. “You’ll see plenty of signs for Blue Tail Lodge as long as you stay on the main road. But whatever you do, don’t get out of your car after dark. That’s when Sweet Pea is his most dangerous.”

Chloe had gestured with rote unenthusiasm to the huge display by the counter. A rack covered in souvenirs, and a six-foot-tall cardboard cutout of an ominous, pitch-black figure with glowing green eyes. It had hooves for feet, long, delicate claws instead of hands and the flat face of a primate, obscured by shadow. The figure was standing up on two legs but sort of stooped over, arms held awkwardly as if caught midway through dancing the monster mash.

“Mr. Pea, I presume,” Julien had said, reaching out to touch one long, cardboard claw. Then pretended to shake its hand and added in a Muppet-voice, “Mr. Pea’s my father. Please, call me Sweet.” Chloe’s smile hadn’t flickered, which was very fair. Rocky would have known what to say. He would have known the right questions to ask, the right words to use, the best attitude to strike to get Chloe on his side, talking and spilling secrets that couldn’t be sold on a souvenir rack. But then Rocky had always been the real actor between the two of them.