Page 82 of The Haunting of Paynes Hollow

“Stay out of the lake and the woods at night,” he says slowly. “That’s what they told you?”

I flail my arms. “It’s basic safety. I know that. I’m freaked out over being back here and my aunt going missing, and I’m seeing things and overreacting.”

“I won’t go in the water,” he says. “But whatever we heard seemed to come from the forest.”

I swallow. “So we need to go in there.”

“We’ll get Josie’s big flashlight. And your aunt’s gun. If there’s any chance—”

His head jerks up. He stares at something down the beach.

“Sam?” he says. “What am I seeing?”

I squint in the overcast night. Then I suck in a breath. There’s a shape on the beach. A heap that looks like a human form. As if someone washed up on the sand.

I take off at a run, even as Ben yells behind me. His fingers graze my side, but I’m already out of reach. With every step, any doubt that the heap is a human form evaporates. A bare arm extends upward toward the water. A leg is askew, twisted as if broken.

And then there is a noise. The rasp of breath, and the fluttering of that extended hand.

It is a person, and they are alive.

It must be Gail. She’s alive. Badly injured. There’s blood and twisted limbs and obvious pain in that labored breathing, but she is—

I’m close enough to see the leg now. A muscular leg covered in dark hair. Then the head, with equally dark hair and tanned skin.

I’m seeing a man.

I stop short. Ben knocks into me, and then, before I know it, I’m behind him.

“Fuck,” he says. “It’s the guy. The cyclist. The camper.”

He fumbles to pull out his phone.

“I’m calling for help!” he shouts to the man. “Just hang tight. I’m—”

Ben stops short and sucks in breath. Then he backpedals, his arms out to keep me back.

Something moves up ahead, right on the edge of the forest. I can’t see what it is. Just a huge dark shape against the trees. Then there’s aclomp-clomp, the sort of noise that you wouldn’t expect to recognize, but you do. The sound of a horse’s front hooves lifting and lowering in impatience.

I tear my gaze away and look down at the sand. Hoofprints. All around the dying man are hoofprints.

Ben stands frozen. He still has his phone in hand, and I pry it from his fingers. Then I turn on the flashlight. It illuminates the figure at the edge of the forest.

The horse. The rider. The rider’s severed head, outthrust in his hand, turned toward the lake.

“What the hell?” Ben’s voice comes high, words nearly unintelligible. “What the hell is that?”

“The horseman,” I say, and my voice is horribly calm. “The headless horseman.”

The rider’s arm moves, turning the head our way. I grab Ben and yank him back, seized by the impulse to get him behind me. But the head only looks our way for a moment, and then the arm moves, and it is gazing out at the lake.

“I’m dreaming,” Ben says. “You thought you were, but it’s me. Right? It’s me.Right?”

Something moves to our right, and we both jump. It’s a light under the water, another behind it. Then the light goes out and something dark begins to rise from the lake.

The figure of a man. A tall man. Nearly naked, his remaining clothing in tatters, his flesh gray and rotted. Ben gets in front of me, arms out again, backing us up. The figure doesn’t look our way. Doesn’t seem to notice us. It’s advancing on something else, and too late, I realize its goal.

The injured man.