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Fearsome Fiction Podcast: Devil’s Wood Audiobook (Chapers 6 and 7)
Follow author Mark McNease deep into the Devil’s Wood.
An ancient people. A tree that has stood seemingly forever. And a walking stick that must possess anyone who possesses it.
Two chapters at a time, only on the Fearsome Fiction podcast. You can purchase the entire audiobook on Spotify and select online retailers.
Enter the Devil’s Wood. But be warned: you may never leave.
And now… fasten your headphones, and tell someone your last known location. The Devil’s Wood dotcom.
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Entry 13
“We’re all strangers here,” she said. Then she smiled again again and turned back to the roses.
September 4
The Spirit’s Path turned out to be a walk.
Phillip gathered us on the lodge porch at eleven and, without explanation, led us down the slope behind the lodge along a row of white stones set into the grass at even intervals. Someone had painted them, and someone repainted them often, because not one was chipped. The stones ran past the cabins and the shed and ended at a split-rail fence where the lawn gave way to the woods.
“This is as far as the path goes,” Phillip said. “For now.”
He asked each of us to name one thing we would be willing to leave behind. Not a bad habit, he said. Something we loved.
Claire said her name. Harlan said his sleep, which he had already told me he’d given up years ago. Benita said her mother’s house. Remy said the city. Larry said a future. Eileen, last before me, said, “Everything, dear. I’m old.” They answered quickly, the way a congregation gives its responses in church. No one hesitated, no one laughed, and no one asked what the question was for.
When it came to me, I said, “Nothing.”
Phillip smiled. “Everyone leaves something.”
He walked back up the path and the others followed him. I stayed at the fence a while longer, looking into the trees. I couldn’t see more than twenty feet in. The air coming out of those woods was cooler than it had any right to be in the middle of summer.
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Fearsome Fiction Podcast: Devil’s Wood Audiobook (Chapters 4 and 5)
Follow author Mark McNease deep into the Devil’s Wood.
An ancient people. A tree that has stood seemingly forever. And a walking stick that must possess anyone who possesses it.
Two chapters at a time, only on the Fearsome Fiction podcast. You can purchase the entire audiobook on Spotify and select online retailers.
Enter the Devil’s Wood. But be warned: you may never leave.
And now… fasten your headphones, and tell someone your last known location. The Devil’s Wood dotcom.
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The Fearsome Fiction Podcast: Devil’s Wood Audiobook (Chapters 3 and 4)
Follow author Mark McNease deep into the Devil’s Wood.
An ancient people. A tree that has stood seemingly forever. And a walking stick that must possess anyone who possesses it.
Two chapters at a time, only on the Fearsome Fiction podcast. You can purchase the entire audiobook on Spotify and select online retailers.
Enter the Devil’s Wood. But be warned: you may never leave.
And now… fasten your headphones, and tell someone your last known location. The Devil’s Wood dotcom.
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Entry 12
I couldn’t tell if it was compliment, a warning, or a piece of advice.
August 30
The group was given two hours after breakfast to relax before our first gathering mid-morning. It was to focus on what Phillip, who we now understood was the retreat’s facilitator, though its organizer remained unknown, called “The Spirit’s Path.” I expected it to be as vague as it sounded. Taking the time to stroll and reflect, I found Claire on the flat stretch of lawn behind the lodge. Proving my first impression of her, she had a yoga mat unrolled and had bent herself into some pose I couldn’t have named, though I recognized the concentration of someone counting silently. I hadn’t sought her out exactly. I told myself I was walking around to pass the time while the others had all gone to the cabins.
“You’re staring,” she said, without opening her eyes. I thought I’d been silent, but she knew I was there.
I apologized and she laughed, unfolding out of the pose with an ease that made me feel every one of my forty-two years.
“Sit,” she said. “You don’t have to twist yourself into anything.”
The grass was still damp, though the sky was clear, and I remember noting that nothing at this retreat ever seemed to fully dry—not the grass, not the towels, not the low fog that sat over the tree line in the morning like it was reluctant to leave.
Claire talked easily, the way some people speak about themselves without ever telling you anything. She had come from a city, she said, though she wouldn’t say which. New York most likely, given where we were, but it could also be Philadelphia, or Chicago for all I knew. She said she’d been doing retreats, seeking, whatever word suited the three days, for longer than she remembered. Perhaps her parents too her on them when she was a child.
“You get a feel for which ones are meaningful,” she said, “and which ones are just a weekend away with strangers.”