Crone

by Keith Rosson

Genres: Occult & Supernatural; General Fiction; Horror; Noir

Synopsis

A haunting, fearsome story of a father searching for his missing daughter and finding darkness—both human and not—at every turn, from the “mind-blowingly good” (Stephen King) author of Coffin Moon and Fever House

“Let there be no doubt: Keith Rosson is the reigning champ of horror noir, fists down.”—Clay McLeod Chapman, author of Ghost Eaters and Devil Inside

Eli Lamp is a broken man. An ex-detective, ex-addict, and long-grieving father whose daughter, Hannah, disappeared a decade before, Eli decimated his old life investigating her abduction and is now indebted to the Crooked Wheel, a local drug gang, as an enforcer. He lives in a rundown trailer at the edge of the woods, where he keeps Hannah’s room in pristine condition and tries to make it through one day at a time.

But when the son of the Crooked Wheel’s boss is found viciously murdered in a crime scene that doesn’t seem to add up, Eli receives a new order: Find out who the killer is and your debt to the Crooked Wheel is clear forever. You’re free. This pursuit brings him into the orbit of Avery Bryant, Hannah’s best friend and the last person to see her before she went missing. Soon, Eli and Avery are entwined in a hunt for answers that spans decades, stretches the realm of possibility, and brings churning to the surface a conspiracy linking not only these current tragedies but the buried sorrows of Eli’s past.

And though none of them dare say the word witch, at least not out loud, something lurks in the woods, bent-backed and black-eyed, clawed and vengeful, looming ever closer. . . .

Release date: September 22, 2026

Publisher: Random House

Print pages: 352

Sample

1

A slate-gray morning and Eli Lamp left his trailer and headed south in his truck to a mean, hard-luck little enclave called Cape's Head. Could hardly be considered a town, really. A salt-scoured mark on the road of maybe four, five hundred souls. The briefest gathering of buildings and then you were past it. Shotgun houses with peeling tar-paper roofs, crab pots and rusted cars in the yards. The sound of the ocean always right there. A warring pair of convenience stores on each side of the highway, with sun-bleached placards for energy drinks and generic smokes in the barred windows. A few people shambling around in the parking lots, each one of them clearly scooped out by dope.

He double-checked the address with what Trying Dave Novak had texted him, then parked his truck at the curb of a sagging balsa-wood duplex called the Dolphin. He lit a cigarette, cracked the window, waited. Listened to the radio for a while, music filling the cab alongside the smoke. Pop songs, vicious as lemon-scented air. He'd had a particularly lucid dream about Hannah that morning and the sadness that he'd felt on waking had been leveling. He dreamt of her often, but this morning's had been markedly bad.

Even with the understanding that he'd momentarily be doing terrible things to someone, a part of him was grateful for the distraction. Guilt for his deeds—the mantra of a lifetime of shit he'd both done and not done—regrew its teeth every day and staunchly devoured him at night; it was only the work that took his mind off things, even as it inevitably added to the tally of bullshit he'd wrought on the world. He tapped a rhythm on the steering wheel and kept his eyes pinned to the left-side unit of the building.

After smoking two more cigarettes he reached into the glove box and took out a Sig Sauer P365. Matte black, light, 15-round mag. The same firearm he was issued working with the county all those years back. A gun he knew. He double-checked the safety then leaned forward and put it in the back of his waistband. Dave, with a few exceptions, didn't like his guys wearing holsters, said it gave off a certain air. This ain't a f***ing crime syndicate.

The morning was tinged with salt and sea-rot. A light rain that jittered the sky's reflection in puddles. He checked his phone one last time—Dave hitting him with some new instructions, a last-minute command to leave—but there was nothing. He walked across the parking lot and knocked on the door.

It opened a crack, and Eli caught a glimpse of a mud-brown eye, a wedge of stubble. He elbowed the door hard, knocked the guy in the forehead with it. The guy cried out, staggered back, and then he was inside, carefully shutting the door behind him.

Eli held a finger to his lips. The man cupped his forehead and looked at him in a way that said he already understood what was happening and what would likely happen next. They were in a hallway, and Eli caught the ungentle ghosts of cat piss and mold. The corn-chip tang of unwashed laundry. Guy had on sweatpants and a red T-shirt with Wisconsin done in cracked collegiate lettering across the front. Gray slippers. Eli told him to get on his knees.

"What?"

"Just get on your knees, man. Hands behind your head."

The guy did it, didn't push back.

"Anyone else in the house?"

"No."

"You got to be straight with me."

"I swear. It's just me. My old lady's at work."

"Alright," Eli said. He had a sightline down the end of the hallway, where he noted a window with the blinds drawn, saw half a couch with a spill of checkered blankets hanging off the cushions. He made sure the man was between him and the living room, the front door to Eli's back. "What's your name?"

"Sasha."

"Reach into your pocket and hand me your wallet, Sasha. Slow."

A pause, then the man reached back, fished out his wallet. Handed it over. Eli took a step back and peered down at it. Folded it up again. "It says your name is Derek."

"Well, I mean, Sasha's a nickname."

Eli dropped the wallet to the floor and grabbed Derek's ear, twisting it like he was turning a doorknob. Derek shrieked and pawed at his hand and Eli pushed his hand away and slapped him in the mouth twice, hard. He let go of the ear. "You're the guy I'm looking for, did you know that?"

Derek, a hand to the side of his head, mumbled something.

"What?"

"Yeah. I know it."

"You know it?" Eli said. "What do you know?"

"Nothing."

"No, that's not what you said. You got the wrong people's attention, man. What is it that you know?"

Derek blinked. He looked like maybe he would start crying, and Eli felt a moment of self-loathing so acute he wanted to lift the man in his arms and tell him how sorry he was and then just walk away. Walk out the door. There was a weakness in him now, years after Hannah, years after getting off dope, these instances where he got weirdly soft at unknowable, inopportune times. Not often but regular enough to be a thing. It was a secret he kept to himself. But that idea—walking away—was as impossible as any other dream in his life, and the moment passed and his resolve returned. Derek didn't answer him and Eli slapped him in the face again, and then again, until the man had his hands wrapped around his head, trying to protect himself.

Eli leaned in. "Did you know that you need to get permission to sell wire, even in a shit stain like Cape's Head? I bet that's something you knew."

He was shaking by now, Derek, taking these small sips of air real fast. You could see the understanding of it in his face, how he wouldn't meet Eli's eyes. Like the hallway he was in had maybe turned coffin-shaped in the last minute or so. Like his whole life had led him here, to a duplex that smelled like cat piss and dirty socks. Dying in f***ing sweatpants with a bleach spot on one knee.

Eli asked him if he was using his own product.

Derek turned his head away. Turned it so much that Eli could see the mapped blue veins in his neck.

"Little bit," he said.

"Alright. See, now we're talking to each other. Where you getting your wire from?"

Derek shook his head and Eli moved toward him slightly, just a little closer.

"Okay, man. From this guy Ricky," Derek said. "Goddamn."

"Okay. Ricky Big Dick? Wheelchair Ricky?"

"What?"

"Ricky who?" Eli said. "Does Ricky live in town?"

"Yeah."

"Where at?"

Derek gave him an address, offered a description of a machine shop Eli had passed on the way there. Tools everywhere. Bunch of bikes that don't ride in the front. "He's on the top floor behind the shop, this little apartment. The back stairway opens up to the kitchen, that's where he always is. Working on his engines and shit."

"And that's who you're getting your dope from?"

"Yeah."

"Where's Ricky get his dope, Derek?"

Derek licked his lips. He still had his hands guarding his head. Eli could see now they were f***ed up, that most of the nails were black, purple. "I don't know."

"Think hard about it," Eli said. He took another step forward and the man shrank back until he was pressed against the wall, still on his knees, his face tightened up like a fist. Years ago, a part of Eli would have liked how scared Derek was, and then the liking it would have bothered him later. Now everything clanged ugly inside, like a single stone tumbling down the dark mouth of a well. He felt small.

"I'm really not sure," Derek said. He was thinking hard, the gears in his brain practically smoking. So obviously trying to come up with an angle of bullshit that would save him.

Another step closer. "That's too bad."

Derek shut his eyes. "Alright. Ricky gets his wire from Brother Night."

"Okay." Eli took a step back, stopped crowding him. "I'm a little confused though, Derek, because you know the Crooked Wheel runs wire all through this whole county, right?"

Derek shrugged, nodded his head. Helpless.

"And you know you can't sell wire in this county without a green light from the Wheel. I don't care what some dipshit in Brother Night told you."

Nothing.

"I need an answer from you," Eli said.

"I know they do."

"You know they do what?"

He lifted his face, gave Eli a look that was almost but not quite defiant. "I know the Crooked Wheel runs all the wire in the county."

"Okay. So why you buying from someone else?"

"I needed the money," Derek said. "What can I tell you? I didn't have a lot of time, I don't know no one in the Wheel. All kinds of shit is why."

Eli nodded. "I hear you." He crouched down so that they were eye-level. Up close, Derek stank. The reek of him sour and chemical, that tinge of decay you got from sticking wire a long time. He remembered it. "Let me see your nails."

Derek winced. "Come on, man."

Eli reached behind his waistband, took out the pistol, tapped the barrel against his knee. Mouth working, Derek looked up at the ceiling and held out his hands for inspection.

Eli stood up, gingerly cupping one of the man's hands. It was the left, and it was worse than Eli had thought. The pinky nail was gone at this point, the whole finger a wet, purpled mass of rot to the first knuckle. The rest of the fingers were in rough shape too. Eli had him hold out his other hand, which was a little better, but if he kept at it, Derek would be out of fingers soon enough. Eli figured his toes were worse. And after you wrecked your hands and feet, that was it. Wasn't much running room left. You either switched to some other dope for a while and let shit heal, or you tried to get clean, or you suicided out.