The Book

Rain beat down on Levi Mackenzie’s head as he entered the cemetery. A black van that reeked of marijuana idled alone in the parking lot. Levi’s glasses fogged up and made it even harder to see in the dark. He didn’t carry a lamp or flashlight because he was trying to stay hidden. This act was in vain however, because his duffle bag full of tools clinked and clanked with every stride he made across the muddy grass hills. Whoever decided to put a cemetery on a big hill is an idiot, he thought to himself in an audible huff. His boots slipped in patches of loose grass and splashed in puddles of mud, making even more noise. 

Once he reached the grave that he was after he looked around, found no onlookers, and began digging. The dirt was mostly mud at first. That gave way to soft dirt which also turned to mud quickly with the rain. He drove the cutting edge of his shovel into the dirt over and over and flung it over his shoulder, not caring where the mud landed. It wasn’t long before the shovel impacted wood, making a hollow thump. Levi kneeled down onto the wooden box and finished uncovering it. The coffin wasn’t fancy by any means. It looked homemade out of plywood without paint or polish. Just looking at it gave Levi splinters.

Above him, a light flicked around frantically. Levi’s eyes grew wide and he held his breath. On his tippy toes and peeking up out of the grave, he noticed an elderly looking gravekeeper shambling towards him. The old man was no more than 6 yards away, so Levi had to think fast. He grabbed a baseball-sized rock from inside the grave and chucked it towards the entrance to the cemetery. The rock slammed into the black stoner van and made a loud crack on the aluminum van wall. The gravekeeper swung around to look in the vans direction as it screeched to life and tore down the street. Before the old man could turn back, Levi crawled out of the grave like a spider and whacked him on the head with his shovel. He fell to the ground like a brick and splattered mud in all directions. Levi sighed, cleaned his glasses with the inside of his sweatshirt, then dragged the old man to a tree and sat him up against it. Putting his head close to the old man’s, he checked to see if he was breathing. Luckily, he was. 

“Sorry, old man,” Levi whispered as he drew his attention back to the grave.

He crept back into the freshly dug-up grave and attempted to pry the coffin open with his gloved hands. Upon finding that the top board wouldn’t budge, he opened up his duffle bag and pulled out a steel crowbar. The wood of the casket creaked as he tried separating the boards. Before he could make any actual progress, the tip of the crowbar touching the wood started glowing white hot. The heat spread up the crowbar and Levi was forced to drop it before it burned him. Soon, all that was left was a pool of molten steel that ran down the sides of the casket. 

Levi grimaced and rubbed his moist forehead with the back of his hand, trying to stave off his frustration. After looking through his duffle bag, he realized that nothing he had would work. He looked around the graveyard and his eyes fell upon a rock the size of a beach ball. The lightbulb in his head went off.

The rock smashed through the lid of the casket. Real world solutions to magical bullshit, he thought.

After removing more dirt and the broken boards from the lid to the coffin, Levi revealed the old hag’s body. She’d been buried at least a month, but her body looked pristine, as if she wasn’t even dead. She wore a black dress that showed off her prune-like legs. Over her chest, she tightly clutched a leatherbound book tied up with a black ribbon. Her fingers looked like those fake plastic witch fingers that you’d buy in a Halloween store, red nail polish and all. Her face was all done up with way too much makeup. Levi cringed looking at her. Partly because she looked like a cheap hooker and partly because he knew what he had to do next.

Levi knew that it wasn’t going to work, but he tried to pry the book from the hag’s cold clutch anyway. Her wrinkly, flappy skin could move, but it felt like her bones were made of titanium. Levi sighed as he grabbed duct tape out of his duffle bag. He proceeded to completely wrap the hag’s entire head in the tape until only bits of her white hair stuck out of spots. To put the cherry on top, he put a black plastic bag over her duct taped head and tied it up.

After that, Levi tied the hag’s legs together as well as her arms to her sides with paracord. Once that was done, he pulled a pair of silver necklaces out of a smaller pocket on the side of his duffle bag. He put one on himself and the other on the hag. When the necklace touched the hag’s skin, the silver started to glow with a faint white radiance. His matching necklace did not do the same. The final piece to this puzzle was a silver dagger that Levi pulled from the duffle and unsheathed from it’s black leather scabbard. 

Levi took a long, deep breath before driving the dagger directly into the hag’s chest. For a moment, nothing happened. He just knelt above the hag’s corpse, his entire body tense with anticipation. Suddenly, the hag started screaming and flailing. A bright light emanated from her head, but the tape and bag muffled most of the light and sound. Her whole body started seizing; her arms and legs broke the paracord as if it were made of thin twine. Levi sat up and attempted to protect his head with his arms. The hag’s hands and legs beat at Levi and her spiky red fingernails left shallow gashes in his forearms and face.

Levi attempted to grab the book, but the hag’s flailing was too violent. Trying to end the barrage, he stomped on the butt of the knife, driving it deeper into her chest cavity. Just as suddenly as she started, the hag went limp. Her legs slammed back down into the casket with a thud and her arms fell back down over her chest, clutching the book.

Levi, now out of breath, threw his hands up into the air. “Jesus fucking Christ! What do I need? Fucking enchanted paracord?”

Once he caught his breath, Levi attempted to pry the book from the hag’s cold, dead hands. He found that her arms could move more, but still wouldn’t release the book.

“Fine, we’ll do it the messy way.”

Levi pulled a hacksaw from his duffle and began sawing at the hag’s forearms. Once he was through the soft, wrinkled flesh, he used the steel tip on his boot to break her radius and ulna. He finished sawing through the rest of the flesh on one arm and then did the same to her other arm; he shielded the book with his other hand, trying to get as little blood on it as possible. Once he was done, his forearms, hands, and face were splattered with blood. He took a small vial and filled it with her blood as well before picking the book up. 

Levi grabbed his dagger and necklace and stowed them in his duffle with the book. He jumped out of the grave, the sweat from his brow dripping down onto his eyes. That along with the blood speckles on his glasses nearly blinded him. He ripped his gloves off, threw them into the grave, and cleaned his glasses once again. 

The rain had luckily let up by that point. The moon was high in the sky and illuminated the graveyard much more than it had been when he entered. Levi shot a quick glance at the old gravekeeper who was still knocked out cold. He took off his blood covered sweatshirt, revealing a baby blue button up, and threw it in the grave. He then took a small flask from the duffle and emptied it’s contents into the grave as well. A match lit the grave ablaze and Levi rubbed his tired, sunken eyes. 

He watched as the orange blaze started crackling as if the hag’s body were filled with firecrackers. The fire and pops turned yellow, then green, blue, purple, red, then back to an idle orange. The lightshow was mesmerizing. The final bit of the hag’s energy was finally releasing. Levi made a half-hearted attempt to push the dirt back into the grave, but he was much too tired and gave up. He stumbled out of the cemetery with his duffle bag over his shoulder.

“I fucking hate magic.”

To find out more about Levi and why he needs the book, read my forthcoming novel: "Lovers in a Never Ending Hellscape.”