The Fifth Mark - Chapter 24 – The Listening Tree

The trail to the Listening Tree felt different now. Maybe it was just the season — the leaves darker, the air carrying a hint of autumn — or maybe it was them. Eli and Kate walked in easy silence, the crunch of gravel underfoot giving way to the soft carpet of moss as they reached the clearing.

The great oak stood as it always had, its roots twisting and coiling into the earth like the fingers of something ancient and sure. Eli placed a hand on the rough bark, feeling the coolness seep into his palm.

“You ever think,” Kate said quietly, “that some stories aren’t meant to end? That they just… wait for the next person to come along?”

Eli looked up into the canopy. “I think some stories are like this tree. You don’t cut them down, you just… add your part to the rings.”

They stayed a while, letting the quiet settle around them. A jay called somewhere in the distance; the breeze shifted the branches overhead.

As they turned to leave, Kate paused. At the base of the tree, half-hidden in the leaves, something small caught the light. She knelt and picked it up.

It was a brass token, worn smooth by years of handling. In its center was an engraving — a tiny, perfect serpent’s eye.

Kate met Eli’s gaze. “Thought you said this was over.”

Eli took the token and slipped it into his pocket. “Maybe it is. Or maybe it’s just our turn to keep watch.”

They left the clearing without looking back, the Listening Tree standing silent behind them, holding its secrets for whoever came next.

The Fifth Mark - Chapter 23 – Resolution

A light mist hung over West Boggs Lake as Eli guided the truck into the nearly empty parking lot. The air smelled of damp wood and the faint tang of fish. A few gulls circled lazily overhead. The picnic shelter sat near the shoreline, its metal roof popping occasionally as it warmed in the morning sun.

Sarge was already there, leaning against one of the posts with his arms crossed. He wore his old field jacket, the kind that still looked like it had a mission to complete. Ray Henson sat at the far end of a picnic table, sipping from a travel mug and watching the lake.

Kate and Eli walked up, the tin box under Eli’s arm.
“You were right to call me,” Sarge said. “Word’s been floating around about that snake-eye bastard since before you two were born. Never figured he’d show up in my backyard.”

Eli set the box on the table and opened it. He lifted out the gold medallion and placed it in Sarge’s hand. The morning light caught the raised carving of a narrow, slit-pupiled eye.

Sarge studied it for a long moment before looking up. “This isn’t just some trinket. That eye? It’s the symbol of the Fifth Mark.”

Kate frowned. “So what is it, exactly?”

Sarge glanced toward the lake before answering. “Back in the late forties, five men pulled off a job down in Kentucky — a bank robbery nobody could ever tie to them. Each one kept a piece of the map to where they buried the take. The first four pieces were just coordinates or sketches. But the Fifth Mark… that was different. It wasn’t paper. It was this.” He tapped the medallion. “Whoever held it could match the other four pieces and find the stash.”

“And the old man?” Eli asked.

“Name’s Corbin Voss,” Sarge said. “Last living member of the Five. That snake-eye ring he wears? Exact same design as the one on this medallion. It’s his way of telling people he’s still in the game — and still dangerous.”

Ray shifted in his seat, his voice low. “I’ve heard stories about him. Folks who get in his way… don’t stay in the way for long.”

Kate’s eyes went from the medallion to the scrap of paper in the box. “So the sketch points to where we start, and the medallion is the key to finishing it?”

“Exactly,” Sarge said. “If Voss lost this to you, he’ll be desperate to get it back. And desperate men don’t play fair.”

Eli hesitated. “One of his people has already made contact. We saw him at the shelter here a few days ago, and again at Biggins. He followed us.”

Sarge’s gaze sharpened. “Baseball cap? Dark jacket?”

Eli nodded.

“Yeah,” Sarge said grimly. “That one’s called Mercer. Doesn’t talk much, but he’s not the type you want at your back. If he knows you’ve got this, he’ll keep circling until he gets a shot — or until someone tells him to stand down.”

Eli folded the paper and returned it to the box. “Then we’d better move before he decides to come looking.”

Sarge shook his head. “Too risky. You’ve got what Voss wants, which means you’ve got leverage. Let me make a few calls to people who owe me favors.”

The wind picked up, carrying the sound of a boat motor somewhere across the lake. Kate pulled her jacket tighter. “And if he shows up before your friends do?”

Sarge’s eyes hardened. “Then we make sure Corbin Voss learns that not everyone here scares easy.”

For a long moment, the four of them sat in the shelter, the lake stretching out before them like a promise and a threat all at once. Eli could feel the weight of the medallion in his hand — not just metal, but history, danger, and the pull of something unfinished.

Whatever the Fifth Mark led to, they were now in it for the long haul. 

The Fifth Mark - Chapter 22 – Truth and Consequences

By the time Eli and Kate reached Biggins Restaurant, the adrenaline had worn off just enough for the cold to set in. They chose a corner table with a clear view of both the front door and the parking lot. The tin box was in Eli’s backpack, resting against his foot under the table.

The scent of fried catfish and strong coffee drifted through the air, but neither of them was in the mood to eat. Kate kept glancing toward the window as she stirred her coffee without drinking it.

“We need to figure out why the old man wanted this so badly,” she said quietly. “If we go to West Boggs Lake without knowing what we’re walking into—”

She stopped mid-sentence, her eyes fixed on the door.

A man had just stepped inside. His gaze swept the room in a slow, deliberate scan before locking on their table. Eli felt a jolt of recognition — the same man in the dark jacket and baseball cap who had been lurking near the shelter house at West Boggs Lake.

The man walked straight over, stopping at the edge of their table. Leaning in slightly, he said, “You’ve got something that doesn’t belong to you.”

Eli kept his tone level. “You working for the guy with the snake-eye ring?”

The man’s mouth curled into a humorless smile. “Let’s just say I work for people who don’t like to be crossed.”

Kate tilted her head, her voice calm but sharp. “Then maybe you should tell your boss he should’ve made a better offer.”

The man leaned a little closer. “I’m not here to negotiate. I’m here to give you a choice. You can leave that box with me, and we’ll pretend we never saw each other. Or… you can keep playing this game and find out why the last person who went after the Fifth Mark didn’t come back.”

Eli’s eyes narrowed. “What happened to him?”

The man’s smile faded. “He met the old man. That’s all you need to know.”

He straightened, glanced toward the parking lot, and walked out without another word.

Kate’s voice was barely above a whisper. “That was subtle.”

Eli’s eyes tracked the man through the window. “Not subtle enough. His name’s Mercer. He was watching us at the park — and now he’s following us.”

The man leaned against a dark sedan, watching them through the glass — the same stance, the same stillness Eli remembered from the shelter house.

They finished their coffee in silence. By the time they stepped outside, the sedan was gone — but the unease lingered like a shadow that wouldn’t leave.

Across the lot, a flickering neon sign marked the entrance to a low, weathered motel.

“We’re not driving anywhere tonight,” Eli said. “If we go to West Boggs Lake now, we’ll just lead them there.”

Kate nodded. Ten minutes later, they had a key to a room that smelled faintly of stale air and disinfectant.

Eli locked the door, checked the window, and set the tin box on the table. He opened it again, studying the medallion and the sketched shoreline. “Tomorrow morning,” he said, “we go to the lake. But we’re not going alone.”

Kate raised an eyebrow. “Who’s coming with us?”

Eli’s answer was firm. “Sage.”

The Fifth Mark - Chapter 21 – The Standoff

The clearing felt too quiet, the way a room does just before a fight breaks out. Eli’s pulse thumped in his ears as he and Kate stood by the hood of the truck, the tin box resting between them. Across the clearing, three men blocked the narrow path out. Two were broad-shouldered and tense, their jackets hanging just loose enough to hide weapons. The third stood slightly behind them — older, thinner, but radiating a different kind of danger.

The snake-eye ring on his right hand caught the late-afternoon sun as he folded his arms.
“I believe you’ve got something that belongs to me,” he said, his voice dry and deliberate.

Kate’s eyes flicked to Eli, but he kept his gaze on the old man. “We found it fair and square,” Eli said. “Buried and forgotten. If it was yours, you’d have dug it up yourself.”

One of the thugs stepped forward, impatience in his posture. He wore a dark jacket and a baseball cap pulled low, his eyes hidden in shadow. Eli took in the compact build, the coiled readiness in the man’s stance — the kind of body language that sticks in your mind.

The old man raised a hand, stopping him. “They’re not fools,” he said softly. “If they found this, they might have found other things too.” He took a slow step forward, and that was when Eli noticed — his left boot left an odd mark in the dirt, almost like the heel had been filed down into a wedge.

Kate shifted her weight slightly, her hand sliding into the truck bed. Her fingers closed around the crowbar they’d used to pry open the box earlier. “We don’t want trouble,” she said, “but we’re not handing this over without answers.”

The old man smiled faintly, and for a moment Eli thought he might actually talk. Then, with a movement so fast it made Eli flinch, he snapped his fingers. The two thugs — the one in the baseball cap and another with a shaved head — moved in opposite directions, forcing Eli and Kate to back toward the truck.

“Last chance,” the old man said. His gaze dropped to the box — still unopened — and then back to Eli’s eyes. “You don’t even know what you’ve got.”

Eli’s right hand closed around the tin box. “Then maybe you should have kept a better watch on it,” he said.

The old man’s expression darkened. He glanced over his shoulder, and for the briefest instant, Eli thought he saw worry there. Somewhere deeper in the woods, a shout rang out — not one of theirs. The old man turned sharply. “Change of plans. We’re done here.”

Before Eli could react, the thugs fell back toward the tree line, moving fast. The old man followed, his snake-eye ring catching the light one last time before he disappeared into the shadows. Eli caught one last look at the man in the baseball cap as he paused at the tree line, his face tilted just enough to fix them with a long, deliberate glance before melting into the woods.

Eli opened the box. Inside, wrapped in oilcloth, was a flat gold medallion, about the size of his palm. Its surface was worn smooth except for the raised carving of a single eye — narrow, reptilian, the slit pupil giving it an unnerving sense of life.

Under the medallion lay a folded scrap of paper, brittle at the edges. On it was a sketched shoreline with a distinctive curve, and in the margin, a mark that looked like a capital “V” with a slash through it.

Kate leaned over his shoulder. “I’ve seen that shape before,” she whispered.

“Where?” Eli asked.

“West Boggs Lake,” she said. “Near the old pier.”

Eli closed the box. The old man might have escaped, but they’d gotten something he clearly didn’t want them to have. And that meant the game was far from over.

The Fifth Mark - Chapter 20 – The Breakthrough

Ray’s warning trailed them all the way out of West Boggs Park. The lake flashed silver in the side mirror, then was gone. Eli drove in steady silence while Kate sorted photocopies from the Shoals museum into a manila folder on her lap.

“Loogootee first,” she said. “If the Draycotts owned ‘land nobody talks about,’ there’ll be a paper trail.”

They found parking near the city building, the practical brick kind of place where deeds and disputes went to live out their quiet lives. Inside, an oscillating fan pushed warm air over rows of index books with cracked spines. A clerk pointed them to the deed room and left them to it.

Kate opened the “D” index and started running a finger down the columns. “Drake… Drayer… Draycott.” She slid the big book toward Eli and copied a string of book-and-page numbers. Together they hauled the deed volumes to a long table and began turning pages.

“There,” Kate said. “Eighteen eighty-seven. Grantee: Thomas Draycott. But look at the phrasing—‘held in trust for the beneficiary to be named.’ Unusual for here, right?”

Eli leaned in. The metes and bounds description tied the parcel to a creek bend and “sheer stone face to the east.” He felt a prickle of recognition.

“Stone face,” he said. “There’s a stretch of rock wall out past the county line. I hiked near it as a kid. Not many trails back there—just game paths.”

They asked about surveys, and the clerk brought out a shallow drawer of rolled maps in brittle paper sleeves. Eli lifted one free and eased it open. Pencil lines stitched across the township, faded but legible. Near the creek bend, inside a wedge of property that matched the deed, a faint graphite “X” hovered like an afterthought.

Kate met his eye. “An X is rarely an accident.”

She made quick copies: deed, index entry, the survey detail. As they stepped onto the sidewalk, afternoon light bounced off windshields along the block. Half a street away, a dark sedan idled at the curb. The driver wore a ballcap; his face was turned their way.

Kate didn’t speak. She only touched Eli’s sleeve.

“Side street,” Eli said, soft. They cut between buildings, crossed behind a hardware store, and reached the truck without breaking stride.

They drove out of town and into patchwork fields, then into woods that grew denser with every mile. The road ended in a rutted pull-off where the treeline pressed close. Eli killed the engine. The forest answered with insects and a low thread of water somewhere ahead.

On the hood, they spread the copied survey. The paper wrinkled in the evening humidity. The pencil “X” sat inside a parcel bounded by the creek on one side and rock on the other—exactly as the deed described.

Kate traced a path with her finger. “If we keep the creek to our left and aim for the rock face, we should walk right into it.”

Eli folded the papers and tucked them into his jacket. “Then we don’t waste the light.”

They shouldered into the trees. Underfoot, the ground sloped toward the sound of water. Through a break in the leaves, a wall of sandstone showed itself at last—tall, weathered, and quiet as a held breath.

Kate looked back once, toward the empty pull-off. “If they’re still behind us…”

“They’ll have to catch up,” Eli said.

They turned to the rock and followed it, the creek murmuring at their heels, until the face of the stone began to change—vines thickening, surface roughening, the kind of place where someone might hide a handhold or a hollow.

“Here,” Kate whispered.

Eli set his palm against the cool rock. Somewhere inside this wall, the past had left a mark. And for the first time, it felt close enough to touch.

The Fifth Mark - Chapter 19 – The Call to the Lake

As they left Hindostan, Eli’s phone buzzed. It was Ray Henson, an old friend from years back. Ray didn’t waste time on small talk.

“Eli, I’ve heard something you need to know. Can you meet me at West Boggs Lake Park? Shelter house by the water. I’ll explain when you get here.”

Eli glanced at Kate and nodded. “We’re on our way.”

They turned north, the river woods giving way to open pasture and the quilt of county roads Eli knew by muscle memory. The late-afternoon light lay low and gold across the fields. Kate watched the fence lines flick by, then said, “Ray wouldn’t pull us off course unless it mattered.”

“He’s not the dramatic type,” Eli said. “If he says it’s urgent, it’s urgent.”

The park was quiet when they rolled in—weekday quiet. A few fishermen’s trucks sat angled near the ramp, and gulls worked the wind over the cove. The shelter house by the shoreline wore its familiar scuffs and initials carved into tabletops.

Ray was at the far end of one picnic table, a thermos by his elbow, cap pulled low. He stood as they approached, smiling just enough to take the edge off his serious expression. They shook hands and sat, the lake stretching out blue and restless behind him.

Before Ray could speak, Eli’s attention snagged on a figure near the other side of the shelter. A man in a dark jacket and baseball cap stood half in shadow, leaning against a post and looking out toward the water. He didn’t glance their way, but something in the set of his shoulders told Eli he wasn’t there to admire the scenery.

Ray poured coffee into three mugs. “Didn’t want to say too much on the phone,” he said. “Something’s stirring, and you two might be walking straight into it.”

He pulled a folded sheet from his jacket. The paper was worn, the creases soft from years of folding. He spread it on the table — a sketched shoreline with a curved edge, a faint pier drawn like an afterthought, and in the margin, a mark shaped like a V with a diagonal slash through it.

Kate leaned in. “You’ve seen this before?”

Ray nodded. “Heard of it. They call it the Fifth Mark. Part of an old story about a robbery down in Kentucky. Four pieces of a map have turned up over the years — the Fifth Mark was always the missing one.”

Eli’s gaze drifted past Ray’s shoulder. The man in the baseball cap was still there, still looking at the lake — but now his head was tilted slightly, as if he was listening without wanting to be noticed.

Ray kept talking, his voice low. “If the rumors are true, the Fifth Mark isn’t just a drawing. It’s the key to tying the other pieces together. And if I’m hearing the right names… one of them is Corbin Voss.”

The name made Kate’s jaw tighten. “You’re saying he’s here?”

“I’m saying he’s close enough to cast a shadow,” Ray replied.

Eli risked one last glance toward the man in the cap. This time, the stranger was gone — vanished between the shelter posts and the trees beyond.

Ray slid a copy of the sketch across the table. “You keep this. But watch your back. If someone else is looking for it, you don’t want them to know you’ve got it.”

The three of them sat in silence for a moment, the wind off the lake ruffling the paper. Somewhere far out on the water, a boat engine growled to life.

“Thanks, Ray,” Eli said finally. “We’ll tread careful.”

But as they walked back to the truck, Eli knew careful might not be enough.

The Fifth Mark - Chapter 18 – The Close Call

The narrow bridge over the White River slipped behind them as Eli steered the truck east out of Shoals. They kept to the back roads, winding between fields just starting to green with summer growth. Neither spoke much. The folded note from the museum parking lot still sat between them on the bench seat, its blunt message like a third passenger they couldn’t ignore.

Kate broke the silence first. “If we stay on this road, it’ll take us past Hindostan Falls. We could… stop there for a few minutes.”

“Maybe,” Eli said, though his eyes were more on the rearview mirror than the road ahead. A dark sedan had been trailing them since the edge of town. Not close, not threatening — but always there.

They passed a line of sycamores, their mottled trunks catching the sunlight in quick flashes. When the trees opened again, the sedan was still there.

Kate noticed his glances. “Same car?”

“Yeah,” Eli said quietly.

The pavement narrowed, bordered on both sides by dense woods. Shadows stuttered across the windshield. The truck’s engine hummed steady, but something in the brake pedal felt… soft.

They crested a hill, and the sedan closed the gap, its grill filling more of the mirror. Eli tapped the brakes to check his speed. The pedal gave under his foot — too easily — and the truck barely slowed.

“Damn,” he muttered.

“What is it?”

“Brakes aren’t right.”

Ahead, the road curved sharply around a bluff. The sedan surged forward, as if sensing his trouble. Eli made a choice. He jerked the wheel right, bumping them onto a gravel farm lane in a cloud of dust.

Kate grabbed the dash. “What are you—”

“Buying us some time.”

They rolled down the lane toward a barbed-wire fence. Eli pumped the brake pedal, but it sank all the way to the floor. He let the truck coast to a stop on the slope, then killed the engine.

The sedan had slowed at the intersection, its driver a dark shape behind the glass. For a long moment, it idled there. Then it pulled away, disappearing around the bend.

Eli climbed out, crouched by the front wheel well, and swore under his breath. The brake line hung limply, put still attached.

Kate’s voice was tight. “They could have killed us.”

“They still might,” Eli said, straightening. He scanned the ridge above the road.

Something caught the light — a sharp, momentary glint, like sunlight on glass. Then it was gone.

Eli closed the hood. “Let’s get moving. Whoever’s up there isn’t finished.”