Hammer 5: Hammer
The coating of mud around the angular object had dried to form a halo of grey crumbs that highlighted a small hammer. It was so black it seemed to absorb all the light inside the trash can.
Corvan pulled the wastebasket closer. Over the drum of rain on the metal roof, he could hear a low hum emanating from the hammer and being amplified by the tin walls of the can. He reached inside and the sound fell away. Did he dare pick it up? He touched a finger to it and found it was cold to the touch.
Cautiously wrapping his hand around the polished handle, he lifted it out.
It was so beautifully balanced; he could hardly believe it was in his hand. Smoothing out a spot on his bedspread, he laid the hammer down. It sank deeply into the quilt. How strange when it felt so light weight. Pressed deeply into the yellow and white triangles of the quilt, it looked like a velvety black hole cut into the cloth.
The hammer was all one piece of black stone, or maybe metal, and the head had seven distinct sides—a heptagon. Miss Thompson would be proud he remembered the name of the unusual geometric shape. There were faint markings on the bottom of the handle. He picked it back up but they were too faint to make out. He would need his magnifying glass.
As Corvan stepped past his window toward his bookshelf, an odd sensation washed over him—it was as if the hammer was tugging on his hand and turning his body like a magnet around to the north.
“I should put it back.” The sound of his own voice startled him, and a dizzying surge of apprehension overwhelmed him. Stumbling away from window, the hammer slipped from his hand with a dull splash, and he barely made it back onto the bed.A shiver ran the length of his body, and he pulled the side of his quilt over to get warm.
A final soft flash of lightning pulsed through the room. Corvan closed his eyes to stop the room from tilting around him. The nausea began to fade as a long distant memory rose clearly to the surface.
He had held the hammer before, right here in this room. When he was very young, his grandfather had shown it to him, and the man was the one who said it would need to go back. Back to where? To the same place his grandfather had gone? But he had left Corvan behind and had not returned to give any instructions.
Corvan turned slowly onto his side and looked over to the washstand. He wanted to get up to look at the hammer but instead found his eyes drooping from an overwhelming exhaustion.
When he opened his eyes again, a foggy dawn was swirling through the aspen trees. The nausea and extreme weariness of the night before was completely gone. Throwing back the covers, he jumped from his bed to stand in front of his washstand.
The black hammer lay in the shallow water of the washbasin where he had dropped it as he stumbled back to bed in the middle of the night. Placing one hand on either side of the washbasin he leaned in closer and listened carefully. There was no sound and no ripples to indicate any movement but at this point he would leave it be. He needed more time to figure things out and maybe Kate could help.
The screen door banged, then his father began singing as he washed up on the back porch. He had not heard his father sing for years, but now, over the hum of the rain, his song floated into Corvan’s room, filling the misty air with images of ancient battles and long-lost civilizations.
After his father went back into the house, the refrain, like the chant of prisoners in chains, continued to cycle through Corvan’s mind. He shook his head to clear is thoughts. All of this, the lizard, the hammer, even his father’s change, had to be connected in some manner to his upcoming birthday but would they tell him anything. Even more important, at this point in time, should he tell them anything about what had happened last night? His grandfather had shown him the hammer as a young boy, but did that mean his parents knew about it as well? If so, would they let him keep it? He stared down at the inky black shape in the water. He didn’t want to risk them taking it away until he had more time.
The smell of bacon wafted up from downstairs. It had been a long time since they had enjoyed a real breakfast. “Corvan,” his mother called from the foot of the stairs, “food’s getting cold. Make sure you wash your hands.”
“Coming!” Corvan called back. Dipping his fingers into the water, he wiped his hands on his jeans then shut his bedroom door firmly behind him.
His father waited at the table with a mug of steaming coffee in his hands. He looked up at Corvan. “You sure are getting hard of hearing these days. Must come from being outside in a thunderstorm.”
“That makes two of you,” his mother said as she brought a plate of pancakes to the table.
His dad patted her arm as she sat down. “It’s impossible to stay inside on a night like that. I might even enjoy farming if I could do it in the dark.”
He passed the pancakes to Corvan. “Do you remember running past me last night by the outhouse?”
Corvan’s heart skipped a beat, but he tried to look nonchalant. “I didn’t see you.”
“I was right by the path when you came bolting by.” His father’s brow furrowed. “You looked like you’d been wrestling some poor creature out of a mud hole. What did you find this time?”
Corvan shoved a piece of bacon into his mouth and chewed on it. It bugged him that his father was so interested in everything that happened out at the rock even though his father rarely went there. He looked intently at his plate and speared another piece of bacon onto his fork. “It was just the mud. I didn’t find anything this time.”
Corvan kept his head down and kept eating, but it seemed like forever before his father spoke to Corvan’s mother and suggested they go into the city to pick up a few things.
“Would you like to come along?” his mother asked. “Maybe you could pick out something special for your birthday supper. I’ve saved a bit of money, and it’s just over a week until your big day.”
“I’d better stay here,” Corvan said. “My fort fell apart in the storm, and I need to fix it up. That’s how I got all muddy.” It was partly true, but what he really wanted right now was to be left alone; to find out more about the hammer and where the water had been flowing under the central rock.
“You’re welcome to come along,” his father said. “But if you stay home, remember to stay out of the cellar. It’s not your birthday yet.”
As soon as his parents resumed discussing the trip to the city and what they could afford to pick up, Corvan took the opportunity to a mumble a quick, thanks for breakfast, grab his rain jacket off a peg, and exit out the back door.
The rain had tapered off into a light mist. The dull sky mirrored his feelings as he passed under the dripping trees and skirted the mud puddles on the path. He cut out toward the steep side of the rock beyond the outhouse. He wanted to get to the top and out of sight as soon as possible.
As Corvan stepped into the ring of stones, the back screen door squeaked. He crouched down behind the nearest rock.
“Corvan,” his mother called out. “We’re ready to go if you want to change your mind.”
He was sure she knew where he had gone, but he stayed low and still. A few minutes later, he heard the truck bumping up the lane. As soon as the sound faded, he headed back to the house and sprinted up the stairs to his room.
He stood a long while at the washbasin, admiring the hammer’s cold beauty. Right now, all he knew for certain was that his grandfather had intended to give it to him from an early age, and it contained some sort of power. Maybe, just like his comics, if he learned how to use it, he could change how people treated him. He leaned in closer. “I’m glad I didn’t tell my father about it,” he said. “He’s only interested in me when he wants to know things about the Castle Rock.” Although he knew that was not the truth, and that he was the one who had just lied to his father, Corvan gritted his teeth to hold in the anger he was feeling against his dad. If he needed to lie to his father to keep the hammer a secret, so be it.
He reached into the basin and when his fingers touched the handle, the markings on the bottom of the shaft gave off a blue glow. Mesmerized, he lifted the hammer from the water. A familiar sense of power flowed up his arm and into his chest and he lifted it over head toward the metal ring at the peak of his ceiling. Looking up at the blue markings, he spoke fiercely to the stillness. “This hammer belongs to me, and I won’t let my father or anyone else take it away.”
A flash of electric blue light shot out from the end of the handle then twisted down his arm, over his shoulder, and toward his face. The crackling shaft of light knocked him towards the door and the washstand. Dropping the hammer, he fell hard against the wall and sagged down to the floor.
It sounded like a swarm of bees buzzing around his room. Shaking his head, he blinked until the residual blue refractions in his eyes faded away. The sound was coming from his washstand, where a column of steam was rising from the basin.
Crawling over to his bed, Corvan grasped the bedpost, pulled himself upright, and peered into the basin. The water was gone. The sides ofthebasin were scorched and warped. Small flakes of enamel had cracked from the twisted edges to create a speckled ring on the top of the washstand.
Panic gripped him. The hammer must be radioactive! It was the only logical explanation. Now that he had brought it inside, his family would get sick and die! But that didn’t add up. The hammer had been stuck under the boulder in the center of his fort for years, and it hadn’t made him or Kate sick from playing over top of it. He moved closer as the last wisp of steam melted away. The dark hammer lay inside the bowl; there was no glow on its base.
Maybe the hammer was actually an artifact from his grandmother’s side, the native people of the area. That also didn’t ring true his father had collected a lot of artifacts from the river caves, but none of them looked anything like the small hammer or had any sort of internal power.
It could be that the hammer had been left on the rock by aliens from outer space. It was said that Stonehenge was built by aliens, so maybe they had also created the Castle Rock and had left the hammer behind as a gift for mankind. When his grandfather said it needed to go back, he may have meant to its home world on another planet. That would certainly explain the large lizard. It was one of the aliens that was left behind to watch over the hammer and keep it safe. That was a more plausible solution but regardless of where it came from, it’s power had both warmed his hand when he was cold and then shocked him when he was angry. That could only mean the hammer could sense his emotions and was able to defend itself.
Taking a deep breath, he moved squarely in front of the basin. “I know the hammer is not mine,” he said quietly. “I will put it back on the Castle Rock where it belongs. I will tell my dad about it, and I will do whatever is needed to send it back where it belongs. This is my promise,” he added with a hope that the hammer might sense his intentions and allow him to pick it up again.
The memory of the searing blue light made his heart flutter, but as his hand hovered over the handle, he sensed it was not going to hurt him this time.
As he closed his hand around the shaft, he first felt a tingling sensation and then only the warmth of the stone. Carrying it reverently back to his bed, he lay on his back, and held it overhead. This time, warmth flowed down his sore arm and the pain melted away.
Drawing it down to his chest, a sense of peace wrapped itself around him like a warm blanket. Closing his eyes, he breathed deeply, exhausted from the long night and the encounter with the power of the hammer.
As he faded into sleep, the nightmare tunnels returned, but this time, as he wandered through the caves, he felt strangely at home in the darkness. The monster and green rope were nowhere to be seen. Instead, an opening appeared in the cavern wall up ahead. It was a wooden window frame, complete with a screen.
As he drew closer, a shadow fell across the rusty metal mesh.
A razor-thin claw thrust in near the top and shredded its way down to the bottom.