Summary: Prologue

In 1652 in Hawkins Hollow, Maryland Province, Giles Dent stands by a stone deep in the woods. He has sent his pregnant partner, Ann Hawkins, far away for her own safety. A man appears from the stone and calls himself Lazarus Twisse. A group of his followers stands behind him, carrying torches and clubs. Twisse says that Giles and Ann have been accused of witchcraft by a young girl, Hester Deale. Hester comes forward and, looking fearful, confirms her accusation. Twisse asks where Ann Hawkins is, and Giles answers that he will not be able to find her. As Giles notes the fear in Hester’s eyes, he understands that the body of Lazarus Twisse is merely a shell for a demon and that his followers are controlled by the demon’s power. Twisse orders his followers to kill Giles, but after Giles is set on fire, he grabs the demon from Twisse’s body and the two burn together. 

Summary: Chapter 1

The story jumps forward to Hawkins Hollow, Maryland, on July 6, 1987, the day before Caleb “Cal” Hawkins’s tenth birthday. His best friends, Fox and Gage, share the same birthday, and the three plan on camping out in the woods. Cal, Fox, and Gage meet at the entrance to the woods and begin to walk. 

Summary: Chapter 2

Cal, Fox, and Gage arrive at Hester’s Pool, a small body of water named for a girl who drowned in it. Cal and Fox jump into the pool and begin swimming and playing around, and Gage soon follows. While underwater, Cal sees a body gliding toward him that he somehow knows is Hester. The boys get out of the water, and Cal tells them what he saw. They continue on to the Pagan Stone, where they will spend the night. The Pagan Stone is a flat rock that stands in the center of a clearing, and the ground around the stone appears to have been set on fire in the past. 

After they set up camp at the Pagan Stone, the boys agree to swear a blood oath of loyalty to each other at midnight, making cuts on their wrists and pressing them together. Midnight arrives, and when Cal, Fox, and Gage make the oath, an explosion of wind and fire erupts, and the three boys are lifted off the ground. A large figure appears, and they hear the sound of a monster. Once they are back on the ground, Cal realizes he has lost his glasses but can see perfectly well without them.

Analysis: Prologue–Chapter 2

The resonance between Hawkins Hollow of 1652 and Hawkins Hollow of 1987 introduces the central theme of the interconnectedness of the past, present, and future in the novel. Cal, Fox, and Gage walk the same sacred land that Dent walked 335 years before. They hold the same bloodstone he held. They too walk through fire, suggesting that the past lives on in their present. Dent himself looks ahead into the future, anticipating the three ancestors who may save the town from the evil forces. The three men (and later, the three women who join them) have the power to see the past, the present, and the future, and it’s only when they act all together that they realize their true power to overcome evil.
              
The importance of the number three is also introduced in these chapters: Ann is pregnant with triplets; Dent refers to his future sons as “three parts of one”; three boys go into the woods to celebrate their birthday and they say “three into one” when they make their blood oath. The importance of trinities is repeated throughout the novel: three women arrive to fight the Big Evil; frightening events occur at “the dead hour” of 3 am; the events of the Seven have happened three times in the past; and even the novel itself is part of a trilogy. Often, it is when three parts work together as a whole that the main characters find clarity, power, and even love.

The characteristics that leave people weak to the Big Evil are also foreshadowed in these early chapters. Intoxication, sexual arousal, and sleep deprivation all leave the citizens of Hawkins Hollow vulnerable to madness and violence during the Seven. On the eve of their tenth birthday, Cal, Fox, and Gage drink beer for the first time, peruse a dirty magazine, and stay up until midnight, all of which leave them vulnerable to the forces that move through them at Pagan Stone and that ultimately set into motion the events that will haunt the rest of their lives.