For locations, consult the map of the Ebonwood Region on homepage.

The handsome edifice of Café Balasco was cracked in places and its sign hung at a slightly crooked angle, evidence of the damage that the entire area had recently sustained. All along the tree-lined avenue, one of the main ones within the town of Farsdale, were other damaged buildings; some more than others. The mid-morning sun shone through patchy clouds above and birds chirped noisily overhead as they glided through the air overhead.

Two people sat at a small table with a rail that separated a roped-off outside patio which faced the street. A female server was just delivering a pair of breakfast plates to the café’s two guests. She then turned to attend to a few other patio guests.

“So, Prof. Abrams, your records indicate that the Whilowhen tribe might have originally migrated from Alaska, that long ago?”

Prof. Mila Abrams stared across the table at her breakfast partner, Dr. Claudio Bianchi. “More or less.” She didn’t want to let on that she knew as much as she did. She wanted to see how much she could learn from him first and didn’t want to arouse too many suspicions as to how she gained her knowledge. The less she said, the more she hoped that he’d reveal, after all, his organization had contracted her, not the other way around.

“We know that American settlers coming out from the East Coast encountered the Whilowhen and other Native tribes of the Sierra Nevada Mountains in the mid-nineteenth century. As you probably already know, the town of Hobb’s Reach was established and it seems that the two parties got along decently. The Whilowhen were a reclusive people and only traded with a few other tribes, mainly the Mekoshe,” he said in his Argentinian accent.

Her patience had paid off, he was revealing more. But was he giving her accurate information?-she thought to herself.

“But by then, the Whilowhen had already moved much of their tribe into the caves from their home in Spindle Valley, right?” she queried.

“The Caves of Mourn; where we’re going later,” Dr. Bianchi clarified.

“No, that was later. In 1892, Hobb’s Reach, with government assistance, built the Rathmore Indian Industrial School and began rounding up the Whilowhen in order to ‘civilize’ them, as they claimed.”

“So, the Whilowhen tried to escape by moving into the caves?”

‘That’s where it gets…” Dr. Bianchi leaned forward slightly in his chair with a look of seriousness. “The following year, in 1893, the Rathmore school burned down and Whilowhen people vanished. Many of the citizens of Hobb’s Reach began to disappear soon after. It’s as if a black hole came through and sucked everyone away.”

“So that’s what happened. The remainder of Hobb’s Reach residents left the town because they believed the area was cursed.” Prof. Abrams took a sip from her steaming dark coffee.

“Yes, we believe so. And, a couple of years after these events, this town, Farsdale, was founded.”

Now it was Prof. Abrams’ turn to lean forward with an incredulous expression. “Wait…after that…the founders of Farsdale didn’t care about the supposed curse?” She glanced outside and down the avenue. A few people shuffled around here and there but the mood was muted. As she figured it would be after such a severe crisis. She looked back at Dr. Bianchi. “I mean, Hobb’s Reach isn’t all that far from here.”

“No, there was so much opportunity for mining precious metals in these hills that the greed overcame any sort of…eh…that’s the word? Tre-trepidation.”

Prof. Abrams sighed and shook her head.

“I know, it is a lot to take in,” Dr. Bianchi remarked.

Prof. Abrams looked back out at the streets. A raggedy-looking raven, perched atop a building across the street, cawed loudly.

“Wait a minute, the earthquake that struck three days ago…how many people are missing now?” Prof. Abrams querried.

“Thirty-six.”

“And, I’ve heard reports that some of them weren’t even out on trips or anything, right?” Prof. Abrams took another sip of coffee.

Dr. Bianchi leaned back and checked his watch. “I’m pretty sure that’s just the news trying to dramatize things.”

“Was there a mention of an earthquake back before the Hobb’s Reach was deserted?”

“I don’t know.” Dr. Bianchi scratched his scruffy chin, smiled, and glanced at his watch again. “Anyway, we’ll talk more about this later, we have to meet my assistants at the caves soon, so let’s get some food into our stomachs.”

CAW!—the scrappy raven startled Prof. Abrams and she looked outside to see that it had flown over and was now perched upon the café’s entrance gate. It was larger than it had initially seemed and was facing them. Prof. Abrams felt for a moment as though the raven’s black eyes were boring into her.

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The post Shadows of Ebonwood Chapter 1 – A Charred Past appeared first on Fathoms of Yiqomec.

Dr. Bianchi led the team past the doll. Prof. Abrams looked back and noticed that Nichols and Brannon skirted around the doll at a wide-angle as their torch’s light danced off of its dusty hair and dress.

After continuing on for about ten minutes, they approached a fork that split the tunnel into two smaller passages.

Dr. Bianchi spoke. “We haven’t explored the one on left, yet,” he paused and looked at Nichols and Brannon. “Actually, now’s a good time to do so. You two go down that one and see what you can find. Professor Abrams and I will take the one to the right. I have to show her what we’ve discovered.”

Prof. Abrams looked at Dr. Bianchi curiously. “‘What we’ve discovered?’”

Dr. Bianchi kept addressing the men. “Meet us back at this location in an hour. I know our watches don’t work in here but just estimate. If anything looks too dangerous, head back immediately.”

Nichols and Brannon looked at each other hesitantly and then nodded. They began walking down the left-hand tunnel.

Dr. Bianchi started down the right-hand one, waving Prof. Abrams on. “You have to see this.”

“What?”

But Dr. Bianchi continued walking, only to disappear around a sharp bend in the tunnel. She followed.

Prof. Abrams guessed they’d walked another fifteen minutes when their torches stopped illuminating the rocky walls and began fluttering slightly. Dr. Bianchi walked ahead a little as the tunnel broadened. He stopped and waved her over to where he was standing. She cautiously walked up to him and found that they were standing within a large cavern. Small droplets of water fell from a high ceiling, probably fifty feet up, and Dr. Abrams saw stalactites there.

But the most interesting element to her was a narrow metal bridge that spanned a dark crevice. She spied the continuation of the tunnel on the other side of the bridge.

“Believe it or not, just this bridge soaked up what little funding we have for this project. We hired some local engineers who built it. Afterward, they got out of here as soon as they could. I can still remember their trucks kicking up dust as they raced away.”

“Is it sturdy?” Prof. Abrams asked.

“I’m guessing so.”

“You mean you haven’t tried it yet?”

“No. We’ve been saving it for a special occasion. You seem to fit that.”

Prof. Abrams looked at Dr. Bianchi incredulously. “You can’t be serious. I mean…I’m honored and everything but—“

But Dr. Bianchi had already taken his first few steps onto the bridge. His heavy boots clanked on its dark grey metallic surface. His free hand rested along with one of the short rails at the bridge’s sides, while his other held his flickering torch.

Prof. Abrams reluctantly followed. She looked down into blackness. “What’s at the bottom of this?”

“We don’t know. It must go really deep, though.”

Blood began pulsing throughout her temples as her anxiety rose at the prospect of falling into the cavern. But step-by-furtive-step, they eventually made it across.

They stood upon the rocky outcropping at the other side of the bridge for a moment. Prof. Abrams was just catching her breath when Dr. Bianchi began walking down the continuation of the tunnel.

“Wait a minute. You’ve never been down here?”

He turned to look at her. “No.”

“But what if something happens?”

“We’re scientists. This is what we live for. New discoveries. Places where no one has visited before.”

Prof. Abrams shook her head and looked back across the bridge.

“Come on, where’s your sense of wonder…your sense of adventure?”

Prof. Abrams pondered everything. She figured that if she didn’t take this opportunity to uncover ancient artifacts, someone else would. She imagined being the first to write about whatever they came across, well—she and Dr. Bianchi. However, she’d not only be able to talk about it from a scientific perspective but also an occultist’s one. Her voice would be unique.

“Okay,” she said, resolutely.

The two had just enough room to walk abreast as they shuffled down the tunnel, which seemed to rise in its inclination.

“Are we walking upward?” she asked.

“Yeah, it seems so,” he answered.

Prof. Abrams noticed that their torches began being pulled forward in a draft. “There must be a way out somewhere up ahead,” she said in a hopeful tone.

“It seems that way.”

Not far from the bridge cavern, a slight glow could be seen up ahead of them.

“What’s that?” Prof. Abrams asked.

The post Shadows of Ebonwood Chapter 4 – A Mysterious Glow appeared first on Fathoms of Yiqomec.

After making it in a way, Prof. Abrams could see that the walls of the cave were stratified; dark in some places and lighter in others. “Have there been many cave-ins?”

“A few here and there. Dr. Bianchi here says this one is pretty sturdy,” Nichols remarked. “Isn’t that right, doc?”

Prof. Abrams imagined that Dr. Bianchi and Nichols were pretty comfortable and probably on a first name basis when outsiders weren’t around.

“Relatively speaking,” Dr. Bianchi replied.

After walking further, Prof. Abrams looked back to see the late morning sunlight peeking through the cave entrance, become eclipsed by one of the walls. She felt a twinge of excitement.

“I really appreciate you having me along for this expedition. Even though I live in the Sierras, I hadn’t been to this area yet.”

Dr. Bianchi turned and smiled. “You’re good company, so we’re glad to have you. Algen may have hired you because of your scientific background and occult expertise, but it’s good to see that you have more going on as well.”

Did he just flirt with me?—she thought to herself. “Well, it’s a treat to consult on this expedition. I know that Algen wants to recover any of the archaeological finds that we make, to shed some light on what happened to the Whilowhen tribe; how and why they suddenly disappeared back in the nineteen-fifties. It’s just a shame that we can’t use better light sources.”

“The SEDIs are extremely powerful here, close to the center of Ebonwood,” he said. “It would be an added bonus if we could discover the source of them. That’s probably why you never see any wildlife in the entire region, it must scare off animals.”

Prof. Abrams knew the SEDIs, or Spherical Electromagnetic Disruptions, blanketed the entire Ebonwood region. They effectively nullified all electrical devices and even disabled batteries, which not even EMP (electromagnetic pulse) devices could do. Even though she lived right on the outskirts of Ebonwood, most of her electronics only worked half of the time.

A little further on, their torches began to fall upon openings to the sides of their high-ceilinged tunnel.

“Doorways?” she asked.

“Precisely,” Dr. Bianchi replied.

As she passed a doorway, her torch illuminated a small room with some type of small objects on its floor.

“Here, I’ll show you one,” Dr. Bianchi said as he led the party into one of the larger chambers, which like the others, appeared to be carved out by some sort of tools. He pointed to some of the small objects on the floor that she’d seen before.

Her eyes squinted in the muted light of their torches. She thought it odd that even with the light of four torches, the light they cast off seemed unnaturally dim as if it was being swallowed by the oppressive darkness around them. She made out some sort of fragments on the ground.

“What are they?”

 “Some sort of fossilized material. We took some samples back to Algen last week because we’ve never seen anything like them.”

“Really?” Prof. Abrams kneeled and ran a finger along one of the longer fragments. “Curious.”

Dr. Bianchi nodded his head. “Yes—we should have some results from the lab, soon.”

“Hey guys, check this out,” Brannon said from outside the room. He was pointing down the tunnel at something.

They exited the room and were about to continue down the tunnel when Prof. Abrams suddenly saw a small figure flickering in their torchlight.

“What’s that?” she queried.

As they came closer, Prof. Abrams could see that the figure was a small doll that stood facing them. She guessed it was probably no more than six inches in height. It had on a simple cloth dress with frills and long black hair that ended in ribboned ponytails. It was made of wood and bleached in some sort of white pigment. It had dark eye sockets, a tiny nose, and an oddly-smirking mouth shape.

Nichols scratched his scruffy chin. “We didn’t see this one before. It’s more detailed than the others we seen.”

“Must have missed it in our initial surveys,” Brannon added.

“What do you think these represent? We’ve seen a couple of other ones too.” Dr. Bianchi asked, looking at Prof. Abrams.

Prof. Abrams brought a hand up to rest on her dainty chin. “I’m not sure, although…”

The three men looked pointedly at her.

She continued. “People…there have been people whom we’ve interviewed that said that they’ve seen similar dolls in Ebonwood, or on the outskirts of it.”

“Were they near any sort of landmarks or anything?” Dr. Bianchi asked.

“They only saw the dolls at night so…they were hard to see…a couple of them said that the dolls they saw were of different sizes. When they approached them from a distance they would lose sight of them and…”

Nichols snorted. “I wonder what they were on,” he and Brannon chuckled. “We get a lot of drifters and runaways that come through here.”

“They were terrified,” Prof. Abrams said.

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