Chapter 2: The Keeper of Histories

Chapter 2: The Keeper of Histories

The faint trail of divine energy was invisible to Liam’s eyes, a ghost that refused to register on his spectral tablet. He ran a diagnostic, the glowing screen flashing a frustrating ANOMALY NOT FOUND, but Moros paid the technology no mind. The Reaper stood on the Petersons' sun-bleached lawn, his head tilted slightly as if listening to a frequency far beyond human hearing.

“The echo is weak,” Moros observed, his gaze fixed on the quiet suburban street. “A copy of a copy. But it has a direction. It flows towards the place where the story is strongest.”

“The story?” Liam asked, pocketing his tablet in frustration. The heat was oppressive, and the memory of the cloying, damp air in the house made his skin crawl. “You mean it’s heading for the lake? To the real Dagon?”

“No. The impostor does not need the original, only its legend. And legends are not stored in water. They are stored in paper and ink, in memory and whispers.” Moros began to walk, his long strides measured and unhurried, yet Liam had to jog to keep pace. “We are going to the library.”

Of course. A library. To Liam’s modern mind, it felt like an archaic solution to a digital-age problem. But as they walked through the quiet streets of Veridian Lake, he began to see his mentor’s logic. The town felt… curated. The houses were new, but the street names—Founder’s Way, Covenant Court, Deepwater Drive—spoke of a history that was consciously preserved. This wasn't a place that forgot its past; it was a place that had carefully edited it.

The Veridian Lake Municipal Library was a contradiction. It was the oldest building in town, a stern, two-story structure of dark local stone that seemed to absorb the desert light rather than reflect it. It stood as a monument to a time before stucco and solar panels, a silent heart pumping history through the town's veins.

As they pushed through the heavy oak doors, the oppressive heat gave way to a cool, reverent silence, thick with the scent of aging paper, lemon polish, and dust motes dancing in the shafts of light from tall, arched windows. It felt like a sanctuary, a place where the chaos of the outside world—and the impossible horrors of Liam's new life—could be held at bay.

“The town’s archives,” Moros stated, not a question but a command.

The librarian at the front desk, a woman with a kind but tired face, pointed them towards a spiral staircase in the back. “Special collections are downstairs. Elara can help you. If she’s in the mood.”

They descended into the basement, the air growing cooler, the smell of old paper intensifying. The archives were a maze of rolling metal shelves packed with leather-bound ledgers, cardboard boxes tied with string, and flat files containing yellowed maps. At a large oak table in the center of the room sat the only other occupant.

A woman in her late twenties looked up as they approached, and Liam felt a sudden, distinct sense of being scanned and cataloged. Her auburn hair was pulled back in a messy but efficient bun, and her eyes—a sharp, intelligent hazel—missed nothing. The table before her was a controlled explosion of research: an open journal with spidery, 19th-century script, a detailed topographical map of the region, and several printouts of recent obituaries. Liam recognized the names Mark and Sarah Peterson at the top of one pile.

This was Elara Vance.

“Can I help you?” she asked, her tone polite but firm, the kind of voice that could quiet a noisy reading room with two words. She didn't stand, a subtle power play that established this as her domain.

Liam stepped forward, trying for a disarming, academic approach. “Hi, yes. We’re… researchers. We’re interested in the founding myths of Veridian Lake. Specifically, any folklore related to the lake itself.”

Elara’s gaze flickered from Liam’s earnest, anxious face to Moros’s unsettling stillness. She raised an eyebrow. “Researchers from what institution?”

“A private one,” Moros’s voice cut in, smooth and cold as polished granite. It seemed to lower the temperature in the room by another few degrees. “We are interested in pacts. Covenants. Promises made to entities of the deep.”

Elara’s posture stiffened. The practiced politeness evaporated, replaced by a guarded, razor-sharp suspicion. She slowly placed a bookmark in her journal and closed it. “I’m not sure what you mean. The official town history is available upstairs. We have a very nice pamphlet.”

“We are not interested in the pamphlet,” Moros continued, his unnerving patience a far greater threat than any overt aggression. “We are interested in the drownings. The ones that don’t make sense.”

Liam watched Elara’s knuckles turn white where she gripped the edge of the table. Her eyes narrowed. She had already connected the dots. The obituaries on her desk were not a coincidence.

“Who are you?” she demanded, her voice low and steady. “Are you reporters? Ghouls looking for a story in someone else’s tragedy?”

“We’re trying to prevent the next one,” Liam interjected, trying to salvage the conversation. “Look, we know this sounds insane, but people are in danger. The stories about this town, about how the lake was formed… they’re more than just stories. And something is twisting them into a weapon.”

Elara stared at him, her expression a mixture of disbelief and deep-seated concern. It was clear she was wrestling with the strange deaths herself, trying to find a logical explanation where there was none. But two strangers showing up and talking about angry water gods was a leap too far.

“My family helped found this town,” she said, her voice laced with protective fire. “We have been the keepers of its history for five generations. I know every story, every myth, and every whisper. And I know a tall tale when I hear one. You have five seconds to tell me who you really are before I call Sheriff Brody and have you removed for harassing a public employee.”

The standoff was absolute. Liam’s analytical mind raced, searching for a sequence of words that could bridge the chasm of disbelief between them, but he came up empty. Her logic was a fortress, and they were outside the walls, shouting about dragons.

Moros remained silent, observing her. It was a terrifyingly focused attention, as if he were measuring her soul. He seemed to recognize in her the same stubborn adherence to order and knowledge that he valued, however nascent, in Liam.

The ringing of the phone on the corner of her desk was a shrill, violent intrusion. It shattered the tense silence.

Elara’s eyes never left theirs as she reached for the receiver, her movements sharp with irritation. “Vance,” she snapped into the phone.

Liam watched the transformation. The anger in her face dissolved, replaced by a wave of confusion, then dawning horror. Her grip on the receiver tightened, and the color drained from her cheeks, leaving her skin the color of old parchment.

“Where?” she breathed, her voice suddenly fragile. “Oh, god. Are you… are you sure?”

She listened for another ten seconds, her hazel eyes wide and now fixed on a point somewhere in the dusty air between her and Moros. She hung up the phone without saying goodbye, her hand hovering over the cradle as if it had forgotten its function.

“That was Martha from the dispatcher’s office,” she said, her voice a hollow echo of its former strength. “Sheriff Brody just called it in.”

She finally looked at them, and for the first time, the fortress in her eyes had a breach. Raw fear poured through it.

“A tow truck driver just found Stan Gable in his car on the old access road out by the highway,” she whispered, the words tumbling out. “The doors were locked from the inside. The windows were rolled up tight. He was dead.”

Liam felt a cold dread snake its way up his spine. He knew the answer before she spoke the impossible words.

“His lungs… they were completely filled with sand.”