What does a man say to something supremely insane yet supremely convincing as it rolls like distant thunder in the hindermost regions of his mind?

“These lines in your palm are like rings in a tree,” he said. “The Redlicks are imbued with power that derives from immense wealth and venerable status. For all that, they’ve misjudged your mettle. You were an unexpected variable. The situation is spinning out of control.”

“All the bees and none of the honey,” I said. “Doc, if the situation in Horseheads is such a clusterfuck, why did you allow Sean to accept that job at the site? You could’ve steered him away.”

“Don’t you think we tried? By the time we heard he’d returned to New York, it was practically a fait accompli.”

“You turned your back?” I said it harshly, hoping to rattle him, to keep him honest, or as honest as he was capable of being.

The doctor raised his hands in defense.

“My own influence paled in comparison to the forces that held him in their sway.”

“Why Shaft 40?” I opened the Jeffers Project schematics on my phone and brandished it accusingly. “Why does X mark that spot?”

“There is occult significance to the geometry of the collider and its unfinished portion where he died.”

“What significance?” I said.

Dr. Campbell touched the map at Shaft 40.

“This is where the jaws would be if the ouroboros represented a fracture in reality. Sean’s blood poured into that symbolic maw.”

“Doc, this is more than I bargained on.”

“Your instinct is to divest yourself of this burden and flee.” He said this with sympathy for my plight. “The Mares killed Sean. Probably to enact a blood ritual to appease the alleged gods of the valley. The scale must be balanced.”

“Proving it is another matter, Dr. Campbell.”

“Proving it in a court of law may be impossible. Vengeance doesn’t require proof. It requires the will and the courage to act. I’m too old. June is too good. Alex is a pacifist at heart. Badja lacks the character and is incarcerated, although he might be convinced to strike in other ways were you to provide evidence of murder. I ask, who else but Isaiah Coleridge?”

I didn’t have a retort handy.

“For what it’s worth, I’m prepared to ride farther. See where the trail ends.”

His parting words were sober as a prayer.

“Light and dark, you are always you,” he said. “The time that came before this time? The time where you stood? The place where you stood? It is a memory. The machinery of fate has brought you forward from darkness into light into darkness. You stand somewhere different now. You must be ready . . . for the terrors to come.”

That got under my skin. I’d assumed the terrors were already here.

■■■

A bigger, badder storm hammered us during the night. Lightning scorched the ocean. Huge waves smashed the shore. Winds came shrieking and we lost power. Flash! Mom sat in the darkness at the foot of the bed, leather wings partly unfurled. Flash! Achilles prowled beside me, jaws dripping gore. I opened my eyes. Morning light had sneaked into the room. Roof tiles were flung across the lawn and the driveway. Beasley got a chain saw and cleared a palm tree that had fallen outside the main gate.