The Vault
© Lana Lazar
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Illusion
Part Eleven of Floor 21
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(Released on Wattpad)
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They danced around him, a whirling mass of music and light. The stale, fruity scent of hibiscus, the cold touch of ice and the fragrance of musk as it passed his lips. He pressed his lips against the taste. It was sickening.
And his friends' blood continued to drip, like gritty water from a broken tap. As though the top had burst off, so that it spurted in a ruby shower.
A woman with tightly curled hair and a much too tight emerald-sequinned party dress tipped her head back, her eyes closed in ecstasy. A garnet glinted against her throat, and he felt the urge to rip it off, tear it away, smash it to pieces. Because why was there blood?
Blood here, blood there, blood, blood...everywhere.
He stumbled over a young man in army dress whose legs stuck out in front of him. The man was discoursing loudly with his friend but turned to apologise. He backed away and tripped again, wildly afraid.
The man's eyes...brilliant blood-red. Crimson.
The Seeker, the Seeker...everywhere.
As if on cue, the player piano started to plonk out a haunting melody that jangled and twisted until his insides felt as though they were being churned inside a blender. Ribs cracking, organs bursting apart at the seams.
He seized his chest with a sudden fright and was relieved beyond measure to find that it was all intact, everything was as it was supposed to be.
He ran for the door, fleeing the madness, only...
The pretty woman wearing the garnet slid into his path with a beaming smile, and wagged her finger at him.
Naughty, naughty.
The army officer was next, urging him to stay, for king and country. He wanted to tell them they were out of time and out of touch, but the words wouldn't come as fear took hold.
The friend and rest of the guests quickly followed. All of them, wagging their fingers, some scratching their hair, a bald scalp here or there. All saying the exact same thing in a monosyllabic tone.
Naughty, naughty.
He screamed. And ran. Head down, he barged his way through the crowd which parted like the Red Sea. A sea of red, bright, as blood gushed in a thick, clotted wave, and surged through his legs. He screamed and was knocked off his feet, as though he weighed nothing. And this was an illusion, maybe he didn't. But he had no time, no time at all to dwell, no seconds to spare. No, none at all. He was flying, flying over a red carpet and a red sea of living death.
His back slammed into the floor and he coughed violently, winded. Spots of bright red landed on his hand. A jolt of fear shocked him into movement. Bright, bright, so bright, why was it so bright? And then, more frightening, why had he coughed blood? Was he a part of the illusion? Or was he a spectator? It felt so horribly real, what if he was turning into...one of them.
The woman appeared, looming over him. The big red smile swam into existence, like a glistening shadow, and the garnet swung, heavier than ever, from her neck. She held out her hand, and she smiled, wire, wide, and scarlet dyed.
Naughty, naughty.
Right At The Fork
Part Ten of Floor 21
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(Released on Wattpad)
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They stood, an army, lined up in fiendish rows ahead of him. They stood, faceless and ravaged, a vision of death. The stench of malaise crept over them as the watcher watched and the Seeker revelled in his pain.
Blood ran down their faces, tar trickled from their every orifice, black, sticky clumps that caused their breathing to emerge in whispery rasps that set his teeth on edge, and made him want to cry and scream and run. Made him want to flee.
But when he tried, when he went to move, his legs would not budge. A high scream trickled out of his throat as the army advanced. The faces of his four best friends repeated, over and over, the worst tape in history because it hurt so much. Because he knew and dreaded that it might be true.
Sin's fine features were twisted in agony, smeared thickly with blood as she reached out for him. Beside her, Jo was doing the same. Her skull looked wrong, as though it had suffered a major blow. The bone curved inward in a sickening way that made him want to retch. Kal shared a similar injury. Blood gushed down the back of his head in a heavy stream as he stared, wide-eyed and bloodshot at the watcher. And Megan...why did she stand apart from the others, as though she was the one who had hurt them?
Then she turned to stare at him, and he took an automatic step back. There was something deadly in her eyes. She reached out - they all reached out - and their hands passed through his chest. A terrible shiver swept through his veins with such force, he couldn't breathe for a horrible moment.
And then the whispers came, the rustling of leaves on trees, the ruffle of feathers on wings, the creep of footsteps in the brush.
He didn't whirl around, because he already knew what it was. Death was upon him. It was upon him.
The Seeker.
Run.
And he did.
Run.
His eyes snapped open.
Rafi stumbled sideways and banged his shoulder hard. He winced and struggled to his feet. How had he fallen asleep?
The stairwell stretched out behind him, far vaster than he remembered it. Ahead, there was only darkness. A seething mass of illusionary black flies swatting around like slippery phantoms, just out of his reach. Rafi blinked and shook his head violently in the hope that it would clear.
It didn't.
The darkness persisted, until he felt he would go mad with it. Something crept up the staircase behind him. His whole body tensed. Hair prickled like needles on the back of his neck, his hands.
That was when he heard it. A distant click, as though a switch had been turned on.
Then brightness flared.
Rafi cried out and threw a hand over his eyes to shield them. Vivid, lightning-white spots danced fireflies in front of his vision.
When he finally worked up the courage to draw his hand away, the entire world had changed. Impressive mahogany woodwork sprang up out of the new light. Ornate, carved drawers stood at intervals along the long corridor. The rich, sour scent of deep hibiscus fluttered through the air. Laughter floated, stale, but growing more fresh by the second, filled with life, across the long-abandoned floors and rafters of the hotel.
Fear froze Rafi to the spot. He could not find the words to form a coherent thought. How could there be people alive when not five seconds ago the hotel had been empty but for him and his friends, assuming they were still - he swallowed hard and blinked as if to shake the thought away. The idea was too horrible to put into words.
That was when he looked up. And saw the dried blood dripping down from the ceiling, landing directly in front of him in a congealing mass of crimson and scarlet.
And he knew. Somehow, he knew, before he had even read the word, what it signified. Pain spread through the entirety of his being as he forced himself to look up and read the message. The proof that this was another twisted game. Proof of life. Proof of death.
He wanted to cry. His eyes burned as though molten rods had been stuck into them as he read it.
Jo...
Sin...
Four.
Left At The Fork
Part Nine of Floor 21
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(Released on Wattpad)
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The darkness was a grave. It folded over her, thick and heavy, heady as dirt. It stifled her, choked her.
She felt utterly blind, all her senses cut off by the endless dark. She couldn't see, couldn't smell, couldn't breathe. It felt as if somebody had wedged great wodges of cotton wool up her nostrils. The only thing she could do was hear, and hear so clearly that she half-wished she was deaf, just so she wouldn't have to endure the sheer horror of what encroached her ears.
It started with a heartbeat. Her heart, thumping an uneven staccato - thump. Thump. Thud. Tha-thump. Skipped a beat, then - THUMP - so loud that if she hadn't been absolutely certain she was completely, entirely alone, she would have screamed.
She caught her breath and tried to squint into the darkness. But the night cloud was overwhelming enough that staring into it was like having her breath stolen straight from her throat.
All she could make out was a whitish lump against the wall, the edges hazy and formless in the dark. Jo tried not to imagine what it might be and concentrated on finding a way out. But that would be easier thought than done.
The passageway snaked long and narrow, the ceiling barely within reach and the walls thick with rich tapestries and unnerving designs that seemed to swirl like miniature tornados the longer she stared at them. She squeezed her temple and groaned quietly under her breath. The whispers had stopped long ago, but the fear remained, worming its way deep into her psyche until she felt frozen.
No doors, no windows, no exits. The only way out was up, and that was no way out at all. It was a blind exit, one that would only carry her further into the Seeker's lair.
But she had no choice. All she could do was move forward. So that was exactly what she did, edging closer and closer to the wall as she did so, whether subconsciously or by design, she had no clue.
What she had taken for a lump, moved. It stood, and took on a form. Jo sucked in a sharp breath and took a hasty step back. Then the figure turned and familiar features swam into view in the thick dark.
Jo breathed out. Her heart didn't quite manage to stop thumping, but it did slow, beating out a steady bass drum instead of a halting staccato. She moved to embrace her friend, then stopped suddenly at the last instant, not entirely certain what had made her do it, but oddly aware that the strangeness had to be obeyed.
"Jo." Megan smiled. It was a strange smile, devoid of humour, yet somehow oddly triumphant, as if she knew something Jo didn't. "It's been a while."
Jo made a movement toward her, then stopped abruptly, suddenly wary.
"I - yeah. I mean, you're okay?" she checked. "It didn't get you?"
Megan spread her arms wide and laughed. "Look at me. Do you think I would be here, intact, if the Seeker had taken me?"
For some reason, her response bothered Jo. Maybe it was the casual way she had said it, as though a part of her had shut off to the horror that was all around them, written on every wall, etched in stone, carved in blood.
The Seeker.
The one they were running from.
Or had she forgotten?
"Meg..." Jo started, then stopped. She changed the subject. "The others, have you seen them? Rafi and I, we tried to stay together but we got split up, and -" She gestured vaguely at a spot in the dark and trailed off.
"I saw Kal," Megan said quietly. She smiled a little sadly as she said it, as if the memory was hard to digest.
"Kal." Jo closed her eyes and breathed out. "But he's not...not with you now?"
Megan wasn't looking at her anymore. She was staring at the ceiling in an abstract way that made Jo frown. What was wrong with her?
"Who?" she murmured distantly.
"Kal," Jo said sharply. "Where is he?" When Megan didn't respond, she took a step forward. "Megan, what happened to him?"
"Kal?" Megan inspected her fingernails in a careless manner that made Jo wonder if she was taking this seriously. "Oh, him. I killed him."
Jo blinked. "You - what?"
Megan looked at her directly now. A discreet smile played on her mouth, a definite turning up of her lips. "I. Killed. Him."
Jo stood there stupidly, her mouth hanging agape. "If that's a joke," she finally managed weakly, "it's in very poor taste."
Megan laughed, which made Jo chuckle, uncertainly. Then Megan moved so suddenly that Jo had no time to react. Her hand whipped out from behind her back - Jo hadn't even noticed it was there. And lunged.
A sharp pain erupted across Jo's skull, white-hot, so intense, the pressure felt as if her eyes would pop out like molten grapes. She flew backwards and landed awkwardly on her side, too shocked to do anything.
Megan stood over her like a dark phantom, eclipsed in the shadows that encroached the long passageway.
"I hate to do this," she murmured, "I really do. But don't you see? I have to survive."
Jo couldn't breathe at first. She focused, and slowly, slowly, she managed to exhale, then inhale. Exhale again...
She stared up at Megan, blinking through the blood that was dripping past her eyelashes, coating her face in a layer of crusting crimson. "Now I understand why it didn't get you. It wanted this. It wanted you." She laughed humourlessly; it was a peculiar, choking sound. It hurt, but it felt good. "I see it now. I see it all."
Megan looked suddenly wary. Perhaps she had expected Jo to be more afraid. Jo had never been less frightened in her life. "What are you going on about?" she demanded.
Jo coughed as the end of the sconce prodded painfully into her throat, cutting off her breath, but she managed to laugh through the pain. "How fool can you be? It didn't spare you. It's using you."
Megan's face twisted with an alien rage, an emotion Jo had never seen on her before, one she hadn't thought the mousy, mild-mannered girl capable of. Clearly, she hadn't known her at all.
"You don't know anything," she spat with vehemence - the sconce jabbed; Jo winced and coughed but she sounded unsure.
Jo used her indecision as an advantage. She heaved herself up on her good elbow and propped herself against the wall, trying to catch her breath. Every time she did, though, it felt as though blood was bubbling thick and coppery through her throat.
Megan made a sudden move forward, her face contorted, and seized Jo by the throat with unexpected strength, slamming her back into the crumbling plasterwork with such force that Jo's head cracked against the brick with a sickening thud.
"Don't," Megan hissed, her breath hot against Jo's face, "you freaking move."
Even if Jo had wanted to move, she couldn't have. She groaned and gingerly felt the back of her head. Her fingers came away crimson.
She strained her head to look up at Megan who was looking over her, a dark expression Jo didn't recognise at all on her face, and whispered with sudden venom, fuelled by the deep sting of betrayal, "You want to know something? You'll get yours, and I can't wait to see what's coming."
Megan's face turned scarlet with fury. "Why you -"
Her fingers squeezed around Jo's neck, throttling her. Jo's fingers scrabbled to tug her away, but she was too weak. All she could do was roll into her - much heavier than Megan.
They tussled for a single moment that seemed lost in eternity, but Jo was exhausted and weak from the loss of so much blood. She staggered toward the banister, feeling lightheaded, as though she was about to vomit.
Megan followed her. She stuck out her arms to push, except Jo sank to the ground at that exact instant, and keeled onto her side, completely drained of any energy she had had left.
Megan plowed forward, too surprised to even cry out. Jo watched, her mouth agape. And the edge rushed toward Megan. For a second, time seemed to slow, her face frozen in an expression of shock.
Then time sped up, and Megan pitched over the edge, past the banister, plummeting to the storey below.
Her head hit the lower landing with a sickening crack. Somehow, Jo mustered the courage to peer through the railings. What she saw made her want to throw up. Megan looked like a doll, broken and bloodied, discarded as if she had never lived.
And that was when the whispers came, whooshing around the forgotten hallway like autumn early come, dread and darkness swept along in their wake.
I found you.
A great, searing pain shot through her already aching head, her chest, her ribs, burning her flesh as though she was being flayed alive. She staggered and fell, one hand clutched to her chest. Somehow, she knew.
She was dying.
The searing heat trickled its way up her body, until finally, it reached her heart and wrung it out like a dishcloth. Her scream rang to the rafters of the great hotel.
Just when she thought she couldn't take it anymore, that the agony would surely drive her mad, the pain eased, the grip loosed, and just like that, it was over. Jo let out a great gasping exhale of breath. It almost came as a relief to die. Living the last few moments had been so hard, she welcomed death as an old friend.
One girl lay, broken on the floor below. The other sprawled in a bloodied heap by the banister. Neither breathed. Neither moved.
Never again.
On the opposing fork, an invisible hand stroked out long, flowing letters. A number. A victory. A warning.
Four.
Floor 6
Part Eight of Floor 21
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(Released on Wattpad)
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Kal couldn't understand it. He was relieved, but also afraid. It was new, unprecedented. He had never been more confused. He had no idea what this fresh twist in the game would bring, or what it meant.
The Seeker was gone.
He knew it as surely as if it had told him itself. One moment, it had been there. He had felt the horrible, cold, pinching sensation that came with its presence, the dreadful feeling of heaviness, a numbness that descended over his mind, clouding his decisions, making it painful to think, to plan, to act. The next moment, the cold had dropped as abruptly as if a weight had been yanked off his body.
He staggered, then sank to the floor very suddenly. His legs folded under him, and he let his head hit the wall, exhausted. He had been running for so very long, all he could think about was how beautiful sleep looked.
But he couldn't afford to sleep, not when the Seeker could return at any moment. For all he knew, this was a trap to get him to lay his guard down. If the rumours were true, it was a certainty.
No, he thought, as his eyes drooped shut, no. I can't go to sleep. His head lolled sideways onto his shoulder. His body began to slump, sliding in a parabolic arc across the wall on a collision course with the floor. His mind started to drift off to a pleasant place.
The sound of approaching footsteps jerked him out of sleep with a jolt. He felt as though he had been hit with a Taser. His mind was fuzzy, but the shock kick-started it back to life. Struggling not to yawn, he looked up and blinked slowly, wondering what had awakened him.
What he saw broke him out of his fugue completely and caused him to sit up straight, suddenly hopeful. Two figures, people, were fast-approaching from the farthest end of the hallway. He couldn't make out who they were from the distance, but there was no way that this was the work of the Seeker. Because however invincible, however terrifying the Seeker was, Kal very much doubted it could split itself into two.
As they grew closer, he was able to make out their figures; one small with a fragile build, the other taller and broader, but still distinctly feminine.
He knew who they were at once. He hadn't been able to stop thinking about them since he had seen the blood on the wall, the horrifying proof used to spell out the Seeker's devastating conquest. Happiness soared through him in a way it hadn't done since they'd entered the Loyalty. For the first time in hours, he felt real delight, instead of the deep, stabbing pain that accompanied loss.
"Megan? Sin?" he cried.
Their eyes lit up at the same time as they spotted him and they broke into a run. But Kal, scared, alone, regretful and mourning for so long, couldn't hold his joy back. He approached them in two quick steps and seized his friends in a fierce bear hug that lifted both girls clear off their feet.
"Thought you were dead," he mumbled into Sin's shoulder.
Megan smiled slightly and managed to extricate herself. "We were lucky."
Sin's eyes followed her, but she didn't say anything. She smiled when Kal looked questioningly at her, but otherwise, her face remained slack, expressionless, in an unnerving way.
"And Sin..." Megan jerked a thumb at her friend and shook her head with wonder, "...Sin should be dead."
Sin placed a slow, careful hand on Megan's shoulder - Megan gave an abrupt, involuntary shiver that she tamped down as hurriedly as it had manifested - and spoke in a voice like a thousand whispers rasping into one. "Like you said, lucky."
The end of her sentence seemed to echo off into the distance, continuing long after she had finished it. Kal, who was watching carefully, saw Megan swallow hard, as though she was afraid. He frowned, perplexed and concerned at once.
There was something not quite right about Sin. It had become obvious from the moment she'd moved. She was Sin, she couldn't be anybody else, but...something about the way she walked, the way she looked - the nuances of her expressions, in particular the way she spoke, it was all...wrong somehow. Off.
"The Seeker got to you, didn't he?" he pressed. "He'd written the score on the wall. A big crimson trophy. One. That was you, Sin, wasn't it?"
She tilted her head in his direction and didn't blink.
Kal's frown deepened. He took a step closer to her, hoping that he could get through to her - if it was her. "How did you get away? Where did it go? Because you don't just get away from the Seeker, Sin. Nobody does. You know that, don't you?"
Sin snickered. "Lucky, Kalton. Don't you know what the word means?"
"Answer the question," Megan snapped out. Sin flinched, but to Kal, the movement seemed exaggerated. Theatrical. It was impossible to tell where the distinction between his own fear started and the truth ended. "Where did the Seeker go?“
Each word struck Sin like a bullet, piercing the skin with a merciless inflection. Megan's tone was uncharacteristically harsh, but a close observer would have seen the hands at the ends of her folded arms shake. She was terrified. Yet she summoned her courage, and she raised her voice and repeated, "Where did it go?"
Sin laughed at that, a strange, high laugh that seemed very wrong coming from her. "I wouldn't worry. The Seeker is where it belongs."
Kal froze. Her words had flicked a switch inside him. Suddenly, he saw clearly. He understood the twist in the game. "You're not Sin," he cried.
It was that sudden. Her face flickered from pleasure to fury with the speed of a lightning switch. She glared at him with raw hatred, her eyes suddenly as black as the abyss she had come from.
"I'm all Sin has a chance to be," she hissed. "Where she is, she can never be anything more than my puppet."
Kal's voice shook with the finger he prodded in her face accusingly. "You stole her body and her voice."
"She should be honoured," the Seeker snapped. "I have given her meaningless existence purpose. I have given her what you could not; I have given her life."
"You lied to us!" he screamed. "You made us think she was alive when all the time, you'd murdered her!"
"I have honoured you!" it roared. "You would have never seen her again if your God had had anything to say about it! I gave you a second chance!"
Megan stepped forward then, and her face was cold. "No," she whispered. "No. All you did was use her to get close to us so that we would trust you, so the last face we would see before we died was the face of someone we loved, our betrayer. Every word, every action you took was to further your own, twisted ends. Because we're still playing the game." She gave a sudden, harsh bark of a laugh. "Death surrenders before its will. It sees you, the tears you weep. It hears you, the cries you release. And it comes, a thief. Its words bring peace, every one a lie. It speaks, your voice. It touches, your touch. It is you. They don't tell you that part in the nursery rhymes."
The Seeker tilted Sin's head and looked at her, Sin's eyes narrowed. But it said nothing. If Kal hadn't known better, he would have sworn, on Sin's life, that something about the curve of its face looked almost proud. The thought sent a chill through his body. Because anything that made the Seeker proud couldn't be good in any universe.
"Why don't you just kill us?" Kal said tiredly. "Why all these games to keep us hopeful when ultimately, it will only translate into despair?"
It looked at him then, and smiled suddenly, flashing brilliantly white teeth. "I like games."
It raised Sin's left hand, clicked its fingers. There was a sound like a whip crack. A spark of fire. The sizzle of electricity. And just like that, they were plunged into darkness.
The darkness was all-consuming. It was like nothing either of them had seen before. It seemed to swallow everything around it, a black abyss. A neverending hollow that crept in on them from every corner, its gaping jaw unhinged. And the Seeker revelled in it. It delighted in their fear, the new twist to the game. And, as if it could sense them, it turned to them, a fiend in hellish ink. Its eyes flashed like lamps in the darkness.
"Hide."
Light flared along the hallway. Shadows were hurled pillarlike along the decaying walls as long-extinguished sconces were brought back to life. Kal gasped and staggered back, throwing one arm across his eyes to shield his face from the intensity of the glare. Between squinted lids, he caught the faint wisp of something dark as it vanished into mist. Once again, the Seeker was gone. Or at least some part of it had.
The shadowy imprint of the Seeker remained on his sclera long after the Seeker had retreated, while Sin -
His chest clenched with horror. Sin. She'd already died once. Now that the parasite had left her body, what would become of her?
The answer was given as he turned slowly, praying for a miracle, but knowing that where the Seeker was concerned, miracles did not exist.
Sin let out a horrible choking noise that set Kal's teeth on edge, because he knew what it signified. At last, the Seeker's dark prophecy, scrawled in blood was coming true.
One.
She was dying.
"No - !" he cried.
He lurched forward, knowing it was futile, but also knowing that he could never leave his friend to die alone.
Thick, black tar bubbled over her lips, clogging up her throat. She clawed at her neck, hacking and coughing, desperate to save herself. But the Seeker didn't care if she died. Her chest heaved violently as she fought for air and found none.
Kal thought he could save her, give her a few precious seconds in the arms of someone who loved her.
He was too late. The life left her eyes at the exact moment the darkness did. Sin's body collapsed, and crumpled to the floor in a bloodied heap. The last trickle of tar dribbled out of her mouth and hardened on the up-down floorboards, against her cheek.
His knees buckled. He wanted to howl, but he couldn't make a sound. Behind him, Megan let out a choked cry. Somewhere, somehow, he heard metal tear, as something was ripped away. But he didn't move, and he didn't look back. His sorrow consumed him until he could barely will himself to act.
The Loyalty seemed to reflect his despair. All along the walls, the lights dimmed, until the blood orange glow was barely perceptible. The shadows crawled. Darkness gathered in the corners spiderlike, reaching covetous tendrils toward the grief-stricken friends.
Kal blinked back tears as he stared at the prone body of his friend. She really was dead. There was no saving her. There was no saving anyone.
He started to crouch, wanting to hold her one last time, to give her some comfort, even if she couldn't feel it anymore, when an icy gust caused him to gasp and clutch his arms, working desperately to force some warmth back into his frozen body. He looked up and lurched back, suddenly afraid. The air was black as the deepest abyss, a cavernous maw that could have swallowed all three of them whole, and the Loyalty with it.
The Seeker.
Then, just as suddenly, it dwindled away into the tiniest sliver of darkness, nothing more terrifying than a remnant. The wisp hovered briefly, as if deliberating what to do. Then it vanished into the shadows, and the cold with it.
Kal stared after the Seeker, confused. "Why did it leave?"
Just then, something hard struck the back of his head. A shooting pain lanced through his skull. Red blotches pooled across his vision as his blood vessels ruptured. He gasped and tried to look around, his hand raised to his throbbing scalp. But he staggered and fell before he could, the pain too much to bear.
It came down a second time, shattering through the bone. Kal retched and rolled to his side as fresh agony seared through his head.
Someone stepped from behind into his field of view. His vision blurred, but he could see enough to identify his assailant. His stomach dropped. The pain he felt was unbearable, but nothing compared to the sting of betrayal when he saw who had attacked him.
Megan approached and kneeled down directly in front of him, something shiny clutched in her hand. Her face was hazy, like a dream, but he could just barely hear her as she spoke.
"I'm sorry. After seeing Sin die..." She shook her head vigorously. "I can't. I can't - I have to live. Please don't take it personally." Her face contorted into something that was either sympathy or a sneer. "I am sorry, Kal. Truly."
She lifted the sconce for the final time. Tears filled his eyes. He tried to raise his hands to protect himself, but he couldn't move. The signals from his brain to his body seemed frozen.
It was a mercy that Kal was unconscious before it struck him. He didn't feel his brain give way as the heavy metal crushed his head to a pulp.
He was dead on the third strike.
Megan stared at his body narrowly, half-expecting him to sit up, the way Sin had, possessed by the Seeker. But Kal lay still, unmoving. Carefully, cautious, she reached out two fingers, pressed them into the soft skin around his neck, and held them there.
There was no pulse. She felt a slight stirring of guilt, but not enough to make her regret what she had done. She would survive this. At any cost.
Megan dropped the bloodied sconce with a clatter and stood. She glanced over her shoulder one last time, and realised that she felt nothing. He was dead, and she was alive. It was as simple as that.
A vague uncertainty niggled at her. She couldn't understand why the Seeker had let her live, why it had let any of them live as long as they had, but she wasn't going to question it. It was a gift, and she intended to seize it. Her gaze travelled to the battered sconce and hesitated.
If I am to survive, nobody else can live.
With a swift glance over her shoulder - why? She was the only one there; she had made sure pf it - she bent and scooped up the weapon. Then she was running, sprinting for the next floor.
Her life depended on it.
A few steps behind her followed a small, dark wisp. But she didn't notice it. And it didn't want to be seen.
Triumphant.
Behind her, on the long, winding wall, an invisible hand etched out a fresh message, inked in blood and brain matter. A warning and a jibe, mocking the three that remained.
It could still come. Certainty dictated - it would. This had been a reprieve. But the time for games was over. The Seeker was coming. And this time, it would not stop until they were all its.
Two.
______________________________________
It knows your every move,
It hears your every thought.
Your fear is its joy,
Your pain its might,
Your worst impulses its delight.
You can't run,
You can't hide.
Prayer to the darkness,
It is shadow.
Pray for salvation,
It sees you.
Floor 5
Part Seven of Floor 21
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(Released on Wattpad)
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Upright staircases turned to spiral stairways reminiscent of ancient lighthouses. Mahogany turned to splintering wood and intricate floral wall patterns turned to battered wooden boards with gaping holes where the wind whistled through.
And still Megan kept racing.
It was a race against time, against a clock bigger than any she had ever fought to beat, one she knew she could never win.
And still she ran.
Her breath emerged in short, ragged bursts. Her heart palpitated frighteningly fast; too fast, if she had stopped to think about it. But she didn't think. She didn't stop. And she kept on running.
Sconces turned antique as she staggered over the lip of the final step and emerged onto the fifth floor. Electrical wires spilled out of sockets, frayed and splintering at the ends.
Her legs ached. If she hadn't been so afraid, they would have given out beneath her long ago. But the price to pay for a second's rest was not worth it. She could not afford to hesitate.
But she could no longer go on. She urged her legs to hold steady, to carry her firm, but they collapsed without warning, and she fell with it.
Grateful in a way, because it was better she broke now, when the Seeker was still far behind. While she actually had a chance at survival.
She blinked sluggishly up at the ceiling and panted for breath. Her legs felt weak, wobbly in a way limbs shouldn't be, but recovering as she lay, sprawled against the wall.
Kal, Rafi, Jo, Sin - were they still alive? She didn't know what she would do if they were, didn't know if she could face them after what she had done. But she knew she didn't want them dead, either.
But maybe love wasn't enough. They could keep her alive...but couldn't they also slow her down? Reduce her chances of survival?
A footfall startled her out of her revere. A soft creak that disturbed the floorboards. Megan would have run, but she knew the Seeker didn't make a sound. If it wanted her, it could be on her before she had time to scream.
That was how she knew, it was one of her friends. They'd found their way back to her. She turned, ready to apologise or cry out in delight - she wasn't sure which.
The sight that greeted her stopped her still.
Megan choked. She staggered back, stunned by the apparition in front her. Because it had to be an apparition, didn't it? There was no way anybody could bleed out that much and still be alive.
Sin was the one who'd screamed, she knew that now. The crimson stains across her chest, her face and hands were undeniable. Nothing could explain away the clotted blood that clogged her nostrils and crusted around her lips. Anybody else would be dead. Yet, there she was, as real as the building they stood in, the familiar smile spreading across her face, delighted at Megan's shock.
Her hand left a bloody imprint on the wall when she pulled away. Megan slapped her hand over her mouth and started to crawl back. Her legs scrabbled to get away, a sudden fear squeezing her heart.
Sin's eyes widened, as if with surprise. Her features softened as she realised. She stopped and raised her hands as if in surrender. Then she spoke, and her voice sounded scratchy, like the whispering of leaves as they scraped past one another in the wind.
"Hey, Meg." Sin smiled, and her eyes creased in the way Megan had always found comforting. "It's been a while."
"Sin," she gasped.
Sin
Part Six of Floor 21
​
(Released on Wattpad)
​
She is bleeding still, life ebbed out of her body long before, and still she bleeds. Her dark hair sprawls around her head like a halo.
She looks younger in death, more vulnerable than she ever was in life, her features frozen in a soundless scream. Blood has started to congeal around her nose and mouth, leaving a sticky black residue.
Something cold wafts over the hallway. A dark shadow hovers over her, then it vanishes, unknown.
Her index finger is the first to twitch. Then her left hand moves, scrabbling for purchase on the ground, still slick with her blood. She pushes herself to her knees and stays there for a long minute, blinking as she adjusts. Then she raises her face and looks slowly around. A small smile spreads across her face as she realises, and she gets to her feet, a little unsteady at first, but increasing in confidence the more she moves, a babe taking its first steps.
Life races through her body, and her heart begins to beat again. Blood flows anew around her body, sending warmth to her extremities, turning once-stiff limbs alive once more.
Life. It is fragile; so easily given, and so easily taken away. She has been gifted. And she will not squander her gift.
Sin stands, her arms limp at her sides. Her head turns gradually, taking in her surroundings with a new vision. Her smile widens, until creases form around her eyes. Her face glows with a vibrant intensity it had never shown before death. She raises her head slowly to look at the ceiling, searching, revelling in glory, triumphant. For the first time, she is truly alive.
Floor 4
Part Five of Floor 21
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(Released on Wattpad)
​
Their feet pounded the scorched laminate in perfect sync. Each step caused the floor to creak horribly, but they hardly noticed it, too focused on the threat behind. The threat that was fast-approaching, and growing ever closer, because they were too slow to outrun it.
It could catch them, if it wanted to. They both knew that. But it was having too much fun. Letting them see victory rise up ahead, then to seize it from their grasp - it was a cruel, cold game, but one that matched perfectly with their predator. Feasting on their prone bodies wasn't the point. The thrill of the chase was more important to it.
Jo and Rafi saw it together the moment they looked back; a black, wispy gust on the air. A thing that seemed to form out of shadow itself, yet had no actual form. Formless, yet it pulsed and reformed as though it knew what it wanted to become.
Jo bit back a cry and forced herself to look forward, to focus on the escape rather than the threat. On her right, she knew Rafi was doing the same thing. They had always been in sync, since the day they had met seven years ago, and even more so now, when their lives depended on it.
The scream shook them both to their core. Jo stumbled and Rafi faltered, but even then, they could not stop. They had to go on.
But the scream haunted them still. Terrified and in pain, it rose like the lamenting last wail of a banshee, the horrific sound of something in its death throes.
Or someone.
Rafi looked at her, a silent question in his eyes. He looked desperate. She knew he was thinking about Sin. It was all he had thought about since Sin had fled. Jo had never thought much of the other girl. They hadn't known her for very long and Jo couldn't bring herself to like someone who -
She looked at Rafi, whose single-minded focus was on the path ahead, and she shook her head, disgusted with herself.
No. It wasn't Sin she hated. It was who Sin cared for that she couldn't stand to accept. And the fact that the person in question hadn't denied or shunned those affections, somehow, that made it even worse.
But Sin wasn't here now. She might even have been the person who screamed. It was a horrible thought, selfish, cruel, but if this was the end...
Jo reached out and took Rafi's hand. It was large and calloused, warm to the touch. He looked at her, surprised, but didn't pull away.
A fork loomed up ahead. The shadow of a stairway crept out of each turning. Each turn in the path would lead them upstairs, to a different place. Perhaps even a different fate.
Left? Or right?
Wherever it was, whatever path they chose, they knew they had to be on the same page. They had to agree on the decision. The ramifications would hit them both.
Jo nodded at Rafi, a silent instruction. Rafi nodded back. They knew exactly what they had to do. Where they had to go. United, the Seeker wouldn't be able to touch them.
Their triumph was shortlived. It did not take long before the Seeker crept into their thoughts, tunnelling its way through their subconscious minds. Within seconds, all of their plans had failed in fruition, and they turned into the fork...opposite ways.
Jo was halfway along the passageway before she looked back. Her heart plummeted as a rising horror overtook her. Where Floor 4 had been, there was only a deep, impenetrable darkness.
No Rafi.
No Seeker.
Rafi turned a split second later, suddenly remembering what they had to do. To his dismay, the floor no longer seemed to exist.
He was utterly alone.
Seeker
Part Four of Floor 21
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(Released on Wattpad)
​
Shadows creep along peeling walls. Crooked tendrils hug long-extinguished sconces and scrabble away from the pale light.
It tastes on its tongues, her blood. It left her, sprawled in a dark-splattered stain on the carpet. After the second strike felled her and the light left her eyes, it could no longer tell where the bristles started and where she ended.
It knows her friends will be thirsty for vengeance. It knows, and it revels in the thought. The thrill of the chase, its yearning for their blood hangs heavy. Slaying her was not nearly enough.
They should be afraid. They will be very afraid. No prayer will save them. No weapon on Earth can stop the Seeker once it has caught the scent. Its hunger mocks the bounds of sense.
There is no logic to the Seeker. What it is cannot be understood. It confounds rationale.
The Seeker devours. It does not think. It exists only to seek. To feed.
No, the hunt is not over.
It is not yet sated.
Stairs
Part Three of Floor 21
​
(Released on Wattpad)
​
Kal's trainers pounded on bristly carpet, carpet that turned and twisted with the staircase that took him further away from the people he knew, and into the pitch bowels of the darkest uncertainty he could imagine.
He cursed himself bitterly as he ran, berating Megan for fleeing but knowing he could not hate her for it, despising himself for despising Sin for being the second of their number to break away in a completely different direction, and cursing his own cowardice for following suit, yet being too afraid to take either girl's path.
Between the three of them, they had left Rafi and Jo completely alone. Alone to face whatever came next. It was horribly true, what they said. In a crisis, a person only looked out for themself. It took a big, brave person to do anything else. And he knew he was a coward. His actions had proven that.
Hide, hide. The Seeker is coming...
Hide, hide. The Seeker is near.
Too little, too late. The Seeker is here.
The chilling rhyme looped through his head as he raced into the abyss. Children sang the song without really knowing what it meant. He'd sang it as a child with no idea of the danger it portended.
As he sprinted, running against an invisible clock, his heart shrank until he found it nearly impossible to breathe. The cold uncertainty terrified him. He didn't know where he would end up. None of them did. Fear also translated into idiocy.
Jo was right, he thought bitterly. We were better off together.
But he had ignored her. All three of them had. His fists clenched by his sides. He prayed Jo and Rafi had had the sense to stay together. Out of the five of them, they were the most level-headed. But after the way the three of them had acted, he wasn't banking on it. His feet had seemed to act before his brain, yanking him in an entirely different direction to the one he knew he should have taken. He wished he could say it was the Seeker, playing his sick games with their minds as well as their bodies, but he couldn't. He knew in his heart of hearts, his cowardice was his own.
The scream broke the silence.
Kal stopped still and seized the guardrail, his chest suddenly tight. The girls...that was one of the girls.
A wild terror seized his heart. His throat closed off. He couldn't breathe. Panicked wheezes emerged in a choked whine.
Megan...Sin...Jo...who had the Seeker found?
His hand scrabbled up his chest and clutched his shirt in a feverish attempt to ground himself. Had to...had to run...
Hide in the dark, hide in the light. Day or night, the Seeker you cannot fight.
Kal took a great, gasping breath and forced the stale air into his lungs. He inhaled a cloud of metallic-smelling dust and almost choked, but caught the sound just in time. He didn't know if silence would work - so far, nothing they had tried seemed to take. But it couldn't do any harm to try.
He squeezed his eyes shut briefly and allowed the grief to take over. Then he forced it aside and pressed forward, up the final four steps and onto the landing.
The metallic odour was stronger here, powerful enough to be unbearable. It was oddly familiar somehow; reminded him of...
Oh, dear God.
His eyes widened as he took in the blatant horror on the wall. It was a repulsive exhibition, the work of a twisted being, designed to provoke terror in the viewer. And he was so afraid, he could hardly breathe.
It was all there, the undeniable proof he hadn't wanted to see. A sheen of fast-congealing blood, slicked across the peeling paper like a hastily constructed abstract.
The blood had been dragged into a single shape. A sign.
A warning.
And a threat.
One.
Floor 2
Part Two of Floor 21
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(Released on Wattpad)
​
Megan scurried down the hallway, her sneakered feet sticking to the scuffed laminate with every step. Every step carried her a little further from her friends, and a little closer to salvation.
In an ironic twist of fate, breaking free of the group had turned out to be the right thing to do. What was it they always said, never split up? Especially when you were living a horror movie.
But Megan had panicked. When she heard that voice in her ear, hissing, whispering like the brushing of chalk against wall, she hadn't been able to bear it. She'd run, without a thought for the friends she'd left behind. Rafi, Kal, Jo, Sin, she'd abandoned them all. Guilt overcame her briefly, but it was swiftly encompassed by the overwhelming need to survive.
Everybody thought she was afraid, perpetually terrified of everything in existence. And it was true. She was. But that fear came with a strange sort of courage, the determination to live, to carry on even when everything seemed hopeless.
To a person who was always on the brink, death was no way out. It was the way back. Her personal hell.
Trapped in a coffin for all eternity, not being able to breathe, never quite knowing where you would end up or if you would ever get there...she couldn't think of anything worse.
She stumbled briefly, and staggered to an exhausted halt, wondering what had possessed her to ever stop. The Seeker wouldn't stop - why had she? But its whispers were distant, far enough that she felt free of them, if only for a moment.
Megan let her hand rest against the wall and doubled over, fighting to catch her breath. Her heart pounded with a sickening force, as though she had just sprinted a marathon.
In many ways, she had. Fleeing from her fears toward an uncertain end, that would drain anybody.
A terrified scream rang out in the distance, somewhere below. It echoed hollowly through the floor, then cut off abruptly, as though whoever it was had been choked before their cry for help was finished.
Her stomach lurched. Because Megan knew what the scream meant. It was the sound she had been dreading since she took off. The ending she had prayed she would never have to witness. And now she had. And she knew that she was, at least in part, responsible for it.
Fear. Pure, abject fear.
One of their number was dead.
Floor 1
Part One of Floor 21
​
(Released on Wattpad)
​
The laminate creaked beneath Sin's feet, making her jump. She looked over her shoulder automatically, even though she knew she wouldn't see anything. The rich mahogany hotel walls seemed to rise around her, penning her into a nightmarish cage of wood panelling and burgandy carpet. A thin trickle of frozen air whistled through a gap in the wall and struck her cheek, turning the skin to ice. She flinched and snapped her head back, already regretting the impromptu glance behind. It was a mistake to give in to the Seeker, not when she might be so close.
Close. She was so close. She had to be. She couldn't run anymore.
A solitary black door stood still at the end of the corridor. There were no markings, no scratches. It looked perfectly new, and yet, in a hotel that was over three hundred years old, there was no way that it could have been. That was how she knew with a sinking heart that the door was not her escape. It was just another part of the Seeker's play.
The whispering echoed in her ears, growing louder, more pronounced with every step.
Hide, hide. Don't let me find you.
She didn't intend to, but she was so tired. Eventually, she knew, the choice would be ripped out of her hands. She couldn't let that happen.
Everybody knew what happened when the Seeker found its victims. Everybody had seen the photographs on the evening news, blurred out so the true extent of the carnage couldn't be seen. But the stories spread. Stories always spread, and that was how they knew. They all knew. And they had come anyway. Like an idiot, she had come. Straight into the lion's den.
Sin bowed her head and sucked in a deep breath, drawing desperately on whatever reserves of courage she might have left.
The black door might be the way out. Or it might be another sick game. Either way, she knew she had to get past it. It was an obstacle, and everybody knew, in the Seeker's twisted game, obstacles must always be faced. Turning back had never been an option. Not if she wanted to live.
Sin was not so stupid as to labour under the illusion that she would be the sole miraculous survivor, the first in decades of death. But in coming to the Loyalty, she had willingly sacrificed freedom, intelligence, and sense. Hope was all she had left. Which was why she had to cling onto it with everything she had. She couldn't lose sight of the end. Not now. Not when she was so close.
Her hand reached for the doorknob, closed around the polished brass surface. It was cold to the touch. She nearly snatched her hand away, but kept it curled around the freezing metal at the last moment. If she turned away from the obstacle, even for a moment, the Seeker would count her as forfeit. And she knew too well what forfeiting meant.
Not just for her.
She squeezed her eyes shut for a second, and her friends swam across her vision. Sweet, tiny Megan - their little 'mouse', funny Kal with his gladiator's build, serious Jo with her habit of flicking her pitch hair back, and calm, kind Rafi who was everything and more.
Rafi...
When Sin opened her eyes, they were wet. Rafi. She was doing this for him. If she didn't get out alive, she wanted to make sure that he did. He was her backbone, he always had been. It was just the way he was. The world deserved to keep him in it, even if she couldn't be with him in that world. It was the only thing to do.
She had to fight, she had to keep fighting. She had to keep them all alive, especially Megan.
Megan...
Her eyes watered again and threatened to spill over. She was so small, so innocent. A head shorter than the rest of the group and shamelessly terrified of just about everything in the known universe, she had never looked her seventeen years, but she had always been the most intelligent of them all. She was not only their crutch when things got too heavy to bear, she was their brain.
A shared brain, Sin reflected bitterly. Because we never took her advice.
She had begged them not to go to the Loyalty, and they hadn't listened. Worse still, they had forced her to accompany them.
I forced her to come. Sin's chest squeezed with guilt. It was her fault. She had been so eager to prove the mythos to be just that, a myth, that she hadn't given a thought to what they would do if the myth turned out to be real. She hadn't been prepared. None of them were. And now, thanks to her, they were all paying the price.
Hide, hide. I'm coming for you.
The whispers echoed like the brushing of leaves around the silent hallway. An icy chill knifed down Sin's spine and she resisted the urge to let go of the door, to do what every fibre in her being was screaming at her to do and run. Instead, she took a deep, calming breath, just like Rafi had taught her. Then she twisted the knob and pushed.
The door didn't budge. It didn't even wobble. It was welded solid to the wall. It might even have been a part of the wall itself. When she rapped her knuckles on it, the hollow clang of metal mocked her. There was a way out, it was beyond the door, of that there was no doubt. But it wasn't through the door.
Sin wanted to scream, but she held back. She knew that fear would only attract the Seeker. It thrived on pain and weakness, and since it was already on her trail, fear was the worst possible emotion she could feel.
But the door...her way out -
It was an illusion. It had to be. It was another one of the Seeker's demented games.
She twisted on her heel and looked feverishly around, desperate to find some miracle that would get her out of this impossible dead end. Because dead was exactly what they all would be if she couldn't find the way out of this hellish place.
I found you.
Her scream echoed piercing through the still hallways like a siren, ringing again and again until her voice choked off and the Loyalty stood silently sentinel once more.
Everywhere
Part Three of I
​
(Released on Wattpad)
I fear he who stalks among the trees,
I fear the silence he brings,
And the voice he steals.
I cannot speak.
​
I fear he who wisps light as the breeze,
But the breeze is soundless,
I hear nothing,
From it,
Or he.
​
I fear he who slithers among the leaves,
Making not a sound,
Not a crunch nor a scrape,
Not a grunt nor escape.
I hear nothing.
​
I fear he who is ever present,
Though I cannot see,
Though I cannot hear,
I know I have stepped into his,
And he is here,
And I cannot say,
For I hear nothing.
​
I fear he who is behind me,
Yet he speaks not a word,
And when I turn,
He is never there.
​
I fear he who is more silent than the wind,
More hushed than the trees.
He makes not a sound,
No movement or trail mark his path,
And I look,
And I cannot see,
And I cannot hear.
​
I fear he who will take me,
Before I know he is here.
I hear nothing,
But he is always here,
And always there.
Everywhere.
He
Part Two of I
​
(Released on Wattpad)
He craves your voice,
The sounds you make,
The screams you give,
The fear that never abates.
​
He craves your flesh,
The strip of bone from meat,
The slow squelch as it peels,
The sweet, sweet taste,
He whom, it sates.
​
He craves your noise,
The deafening chatter of friends among still trees,
The trill of phones as one rings and the other responds,
The explosive laughter when a joke is told.
You are,
You are,
You are.
​
He who craves,
Craves you,
Your voice,
Your taste,
Your noise.
Tuck away the phone,
And speak no more,
For once you enter the woods,
He is he,
And you are his,
And you can never be more.
I
Part One of I
​
(Released on Wattpad)
No sound . . . I walk tall through the trees.
No sweeping wind . . . I stride across a fallen trunk.
No creeping breeze . . . I slide between two halves of a burnt conifer.
No tickling leaves . . . I slither through the brush.
No whispering insects . . . I launch over the canopy.
No humming birds . . . I slurp the last sliver of feather away.
No buzzing phone . . . he dropped it.
No human breaths . . . his eyes are closed.
No cries for help . . . he is fallen.
No man . . . he is gone.
Silence in the forest.
Silence in my home.
Silence in the trees,
Silence reigns supreme.
Whisper not,
Your hush is a scream.
Prowl no more,
I hear your every keen.
Silence when I strike.
Silence when I feast.
Silence when I stalk,
Silence, silence . . . why am I whom you seek?
BOBBIE - Part 1
(Released for Halloween 2024)
EVENTS: 2021
​
Tangerine-orange jack-o’-lanterns leered at me from the window, dangling from the frame on thin black wire. Their eerie golden glow cast dancing shadows across the display – one of the freakiest dolls I had ever seen. Its entire frame seemed to be a solid mesh of jagged blue metal and distended connectors that sprung at uneven angles to its body. Chipped paint flaked in smoky wisps around warped rabbit ears, while the gaping jaw revealed rows and rows of sharp, pointed incisors, packed so close together, it was a wonder there was room for all of them in that grinning maw.
But it was the eyes that drew and repelled me all at once – eyes that seemed in a strange way to be human. Balls that were shiny, as if moist with fluid; irises that had once been brown, but over time had dulled to a sinister crimson; blood vessels that should never have belonged to anything so inhuman . . . because they were too alive. I could almost see them blink, but of course, that could only be my imagination.
I drew my scarf tighter around my throat and bent to read the scrawled sign affixed to its clawed foot:
‘MAKE FRIENDS WITH BOBBIE, THE WORLD’S MOST ADVANCED ANIMATRONIC,
BROUGHT TO YOU THIS HALLOWEEN BY BERENHO ENTERTAINMENT.’
I swallowed and straightened up, thoroughly spooked, but at the same time, interested despite myself. It wasn’t a doll, after all. It was an animatronic; a thinking, moving robot. I had always been interested in robotics, but had never been especially good at building them. Which was why I loved to collect kits, but couldn’t put them together. Piles and piles of cardboard robot-making kits mouldering away in the dustiest corner of my bedroom. It drove my mom crazy.
But this one was complete. It was the freakiest thing I had ever seen, but it was also the most incredible. Before I knew it, my hand was on the door, and I was crossing the threshold, the bell cackling tunelessly above my head.
If possible, the shop was even more disconcerting at close quarters. Dim light flickered threateningly overhead, alternating between red and blue flashing strobes, so intense that it made my eyes ache; tottering heaps of unmarked cardboard boxes, not unlike the ones festering in my room, all spotted generously with mold spots. The stench of damp was overwhelming enough that I sneezed several times.
As I reached the end of the narrow passage and turned the corner, I saw that the shop had come to an abrupt end – nothing more than a few trinketry items, a large vent big enough for a person just above the skirting, and an unoccupied counter. Dust lay heavy over everything, and I could make out a strange, overcloying, metallic stench that I couldn’t quite place.
An uneasy feeling came upon me at that moment, that had nothing to do with the deserted counter, and I almost turned around and left. That was when I spotted more animatronics – miniatures, hundreds of them, all lined haphazardly on narrow shelves below the counter, all put together in perfect shape, almost like a lure.
If it was a lure, it worked. I knelt, careful to avoid the gum and wadded up bits of tissue in my way, and picked up the nearest box with a barely concealed shiver of excitement.
The box was small, barely taller than fifteen centimetres. It was plain, unmarked except for the name ‘CHICKY’ in bright pink block lettering, with a flimsy plastic window which was so dusty, I couldn’t see the toy inside. I twisted the box upside down, curious. There was nothing else, not even a company logo. The only other thing I could make out was the word ‘BERENHO’, in such tiny writing that I had to squint to read it.
I wiped the dust carefully off the plastic and tilted the box so that it caught what little light there was. The robot inside was undoubtedly more attractive than the horror show in the window. It had bright pink hair in two girlish bunches, brilliant white face paint, two generous blotches of pink for blush, and the gaudiest accessories I had ever seen on a doll. Sure, it was pretty, but there was something off about this one, too.
Like the animatronic in the window, its eyes were wrong. They were too bright, too shiny, too weirdly . . . well, alive. There was no other way to describe it, except that it made me want to fling the box down and dash out of the shop without a second thought.
The only thing that stilled me was the price, and the thought that something this opportune might never come my way again. While I was busy deliberating whether to pay or drop the box and run, something moved.
A shadow, shuffling behind the vent . . . screws pinging off, one by one. I froze, my feet stuck to the floor. I couldn’t move even if I had wanted to. A low grunting noise. Then the vent peeled away . . .
. . . and crashed to the floor.
My scream would have done credit to a factory siren. A bushy black head, grey with dust, burst out of the vent and stared at me through unmistakably human eyes which happened to be an astonishing shade of green. The thin lips parted and let out an unmistakably human oath. Then a pair of calloused hands were planted on the floor and the man pushed himself up with a groan, dusting his hair off.
“Would you stop screaming?” he demanded coldly.
I could only gape at him stupidly, the box clutched in my hand. The boy – I saw now that despite his height, he wasn’t much older than I was – shook his head and shoved the vent back into place without bothering to retrieve the screws. Then he stalked behind the counter and began to jab some buttons on the cash register.
“You want that?” he asked shortly, jerking his head at the box I still held.
“Er . . .”
“Seriously, we’re closing in ten minutes,” the boy remarked rudely. “So unless you want to buy something, stop standing there gawping at me like a fish head and scat.”
“Oh, sorry.” I blushed at his tone and nodded a little awkwardly towards the window. “I was just wondering about your animatronics, are they all like that one?”
The boy snorted and leant his elbows on the counter. “What, alive?”
I blushed a deeper shade of crimson and mumbled, “Obviously not. I meant, why are their eyes so weird?”
He shrugged and straightened up, running both hands through his bushy mane. “Just the way they’re made, I guess. They’re supposed to be cutting edge, the latest thing in robotics. Suppose that’s your perfectly normal explanation. Now do you want to buy that thing or not?”
I stared once more at the animatronic and felt another involuntary shiver course through my body. It really was uncanny how human the eyes were, but it couldn’t be real . . . could it?
“Five minutes,” the boy reminded me, tapping an imaginary watch.
I sighed and put the box on the counter. “Fine. Ring me up.”
The boy had been nothing but rude to me so far, so no one was more surprised than me when he started to chat casually to me as though he hadn’t described me as a fish head five minutes ago.
“You live around here?” he asked, as he tried to find the barcode and failed.
“Hereabouts,” I responded vaguely. Would he hurry up?
“So I guess you go to St Faith’s, right?”
“Mm,” noncommittally. Where the hell was that barcode?
“I’m Jay, by the way,” he volunteered after a moment, never mind that I hadn’t asked for it, “Jay Stokes.”
I sighed and didn’t respond. I think he got the hint.
The huffing and swearing took another minute. Eventually, he slit the Sellotape sealing the lid down and found a written code inside the packaging, but no lines. What was it with this thing? It was like they didn’t want an easy sale. Everything about this robot seemed designed specially so that it wouldn’t get sold. So why make it at all?
I shuffled my feet and fiddled with the coins in my pocket, feeling more and more awkward by the minute. Every second Jay spent grumpily jabbing numbers into the antique computer was another second I wondered whether I was making the right decision, buying this thing. And if I was starting to think of it as a thing, that couldn’t be a good sign either.
Finally, a crashing sound brought me back to the present with a jolt. At the same time, the piercing trill of a mobile alarm startled us both. Jay set the box down with a huff and dug in his pocket. He turned the alarm off, before eyeing me with an irritated glare, as though this whole thing was my fault.
“Right,” he said shortly. “The computer’s frozen, this stupid till’s jammed again, and it’s closing time.” He slid the box across to me and raised one very dark eyebrow. “Are you sure you want this? I know it’s Halloween in a couple of days and I’m sure it’d make a great hanging piece and all, but it’s so . . . ugly.”
I couldn’t help laughing at that, despite myself. “It is that, but I really wanted one of these animatronics, and this one’s affordable at least.”
Jay sighed and stepped out from behind the counter. “Sure, but it isn’t going through, either.” He tapped his chin for a moment, thinking, then seemed to come to a decision. “You know what, if you’re so dead set on this thing, you can have the one in the window.”
“What?” I exclaimed in surprise as Jay brushed past me and marched into the narrow passageway, the flashing strobe lights sending his shoulders into sharp relief. “Are you sure? Isn’t that supposed to be, you know, for display purposes?”
“You kidding?” he called back. “Dad’s wanted to get rid of that gross thing forever. We didn’t even want it, but the company shoved it in with our order. Best I can guess is they didn’t have the hots for it any more than we do.”
“But . . . it was in the display.”
“Yeah, because it’s the season to be freaky. Dad figured it’d draw more customers.” I blushed. It had drawn me. Jay continued, unaware of my thoughts, “The moment Halloween was over, we were going to junk it. But if you’re into this sort of thing, better you get it than the trash. Somebody might as well get some use out of it.”
“But -”
A muffled oath followed by a loud crash caused me to sprint down the passageway, suddenly afraid that something bad had happened.
I couldn’t explain the feeling, but something had been off ever since I had entered the shop. And the feeling had only gotten worse the longer I stayed. Right now, it felt as if the pent-up atmosphere was reaching breaking point.
I found Jay beating the wall with his foot, his cheeks flushed red with fury. His eyes flashed such an intense green, I had to blink twice before I was convinced he wasn’t a dream. He spun around as I approached and turned his ire onto me, jabbing an angry fist towards the display. His expression was almost apoplectic.
“Will you look at this!” he exploded.
I craned to see around his shoulder and stopped still, stunned. I could only stare in shock at the empty window. No animatronic, no freakily human eyes. Only the sign, ‘MAKE FRIENDS WITH BOBBIE’, smirking at us from the dusty pane.
“W-where did it go?” I stammered stupidly, twisting around as if the bunny would somehow be peeping at us from the pile of boxes.
Jay’s eyes were dark with suppressed anger as he threw the bolt on the door and yanked the blinds down so hard that a fracture tore through the bottom slats. A well-aimed finger sent the shutters rolling down with a deafening clatter.
The shop secured, he shoved past me, almost knocking me over, and stomped back to the counter in a towering temper.
“I’ll tell you where,” he fumed. “Probably on its way to a shed or somebody’s attic. Best I can guess is that some jackass stole it on a dare. They’re probably having a good laugh about it right now while we hack around here like idiots.”
“Don’t be mad,” I tried to reassure him as he stormed behind the counter and landed a heavy fist on the malfunctioning monitor. “It’ll be okay. There’ll be insurance.”
“I’m not mad about the stupid toy,” he snapped, twisting the key to lock the register. “It didn’t cost us a penny, and we wouldn’t have paid it if it had. I’m mad that someone had the nerve to break in here and steal it. Seriously, whatever happened to honesty?”
He sunk his head into his hands and took a deep breath, his shoulders shaking as he struggled to control himself. When he looked at me, it was with a sheepish smile.
“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to go ape-crazy on you like that. It just . . . really bugs me when people think they can do whatever they want and there won’t be any consequences.”
“There are always consequences to actions,” I found myself saying automatically before I could stop myself. “Whether you see it or not.”
Jay stared at me for a moment. I couldn’t tell what he was thinking. He started to open his mouth –
Something thudded behind the vent.
Our heads whipped round at the same time.
Silence. Then a scrape, like something damaged dragging along a hard, stone floor. Scrape, scratch, scrape, scra-atch. The sound gradually faded away into the distance.
Silence again.
My breath caught. My heart started thumping so hard in my chest I was sure Jay could hear it. The silence stretched so long that I could make out every little noise in the shop – the slow tip-tap of a leak somewhere, the rattling of the wind against the shutters, the husky breaths I’d begun to notice Jay released when he was stressed, angry or nervous. But nowhere could I hear the low scrape of whatever had passed behind the vent.
I think we both realised that the screws hadn’t been replaced at the same time.
The Midnight Garden
Danny's footsteps echoed hollowly around the deserted gallery. The flat taps of his shoes boomeranged eerily off the surrounding walls. His flashlight spun mechanically on a length of worn string that had been twisted around his finger. The walls soared to dizzying heights above and around him, chipped wood and hollowed-out breaks in the timber fashioned into an elaborate carving.
A timber gallery.
That was what they called it. A fancy name for a piece of carved wood. Or, as he liked to think of it, kindling waiting to happen. Danny had glanced briefly at it as he circled the expanse of mottled wood, blackened with age on his rounds. But he hadn't been much impressed. He could make something ten times as good with his eyes closed, of that he was smugly certain.
Danny stopped now and stood directly in front of the wall, staring critically at the timber gallery, hands buried in his coat pockets. Despite his reservations, he had never actually taken the time out to truly study the intricate, hewn art and it took him by surprise.
The sneer froze on his lips.
It was alive. Alive with the wonder of nature and night. The scene exuded an otherworldly allure. Towering on opposite ends of the carving rose a pair of trees, as gnarled and ancient as the wood they had been scored from, their twisting, contorting branches extending towards the other and tangling where they met in a gnarled embrace. Flowers - crimson red roses, budding orchids kissed with a hint of lilac, the merest whisper of green blossoming in a spark of colour - encircled the garden in an extraordinary, marauding blaze of light. A soft breeze seemed to float through the ethereal garden, wafting up below tender leaves and delicate petals, an eternal flicker through an otherwise tranquil oasis.
But was it a ruse? An uncanny subterfuge contrived by the nameless artist? How perfect was this paradise, this Elysium? An imperishable heaven on earth, a utopia of contentment as long as he remained fascinated by it. Yet, a pinprick of unease swirled unbidden around his stomach. It itched at his core and niggled at the back of his throat. Paradise, that's what this was supposed to depict. Then why did he feel so vulnerable? So . . . exposed?
A imperceptible flicker blurred at the corners of Danny's vision. He swivelled around immediately, his sharp eyes darting over the abandoned galley. Rows of paintings, carvings and oddments on display stretched out dizzyingly in all directions, but nowhere could he place the source of his unease. His gaze slid reluctantly back to the carving and a nauseated gasp choked in his throat.
Valhalla had turned into damnation on Earth.
Ruse. Deception. Trickery. The words gyrated soundlessly on his tongue as he goggled at Abaddon, mouth agape, his jaws working in silent horror. The trees no longer seemed benign, their warped branches grabbing at each other, scraping, gouging, blackened lacerations remaining where huge chunks had been viciously scored out of the blistering wood. Screaming, wailing faces contorted in anguish - licking flames - searing heat - charred flesh - a never-ending dirge of pain and torment howling in a cacophony of screeching lament.
Danny gasped, tried to look away, speechless with horror, but his feet remained stubbornly rooted to the spot, refusing to move. Soundless wails burned in his throat. Bitter tears pricked at his eyes. It was not just the trees that had mutated. Even the flowers seemed to be mocking him.
The crimson petals of the roses darkened with the red of blood. It pooled up from the centre and cascaded over the edges. It seeped into the woodwork below where it saturated the grass, choking the emerald-sage into a virulent crimson. The orchids mutilated with charcoal, blackened at the edges, the pleasant green of the grass fading into insignificance in the violence of the surroundings. Even the gentle breeze had morphed into something far more dreadful. It whipped, it shrieked, it tore through the nightmarish garden in a frenzy of destruction, hellbent. Petals shredded in its wake, the hellish blooms lamenting in a sea of blood, while barbed vines deformed and distorted, ensnaring the branches where they lay, shooting up and around the carving, freezing it in place like a demented snapshot.
Stare into the abyss, they say, and the abyss will stare back into you. Danny's gaze had drained sightlessly into its depths until the abyss claimed him. He couldn't move, couldn't breathe. All he could do was gaze soundlessly at the fiendish abomination unfolding in front of him. His jaw was slack, spit drooling down the side of his mouth. Only one thing shifted in the motionless gallery. His eyes, sliding sluggishly towards the plague, set into a deep recess where the shadows embosomed it in their dark embrace.
It was called the Midnight Garden.
SILENT NIGHT, DEADLY NIGHT
(Released for Christmas 2023)
It was Christmas Eve when it happened, that horrible, horrible thing. My friend Alison had invited us all to a party at her place while her parents were away, and I was looking forward to it because, party without parents? Completely awesome.
“Come on!” I yelled at my brother. “Will you hurry up? We’re going to be late for Alison’s party!”
“Alright, alright!” He yelled back. “I’m on my way down!”
Kyle thundered down the stairs and leapt the last few, landing smoothly at the bottom. He bowed smugly with a grin. I clapped to make him happy, pretending to be impressed, even though I really wasn’t.
Kyle and me, we were twins. We shared the same dark hair, the same brooding hazel eyes, even the same cleft in our chin. And of course, our parents were the same, too. The only thing we didn’t share were our personalities. While Kyle was kind of arrogant with a ego complex, I was quiet and shy, the kind of girl who tended to huddle in a corner at parties. With my friends and family, I opened up, but to outsiders, I could barely manage a word.
I admit, sometimes I was a little jealous of how easily Kyle was able to make friends, how easily he could talk to other people. For me, the same thing was extremely difficult. I would stammer and stutter and end up driving the person away before they really had a chance to get to know me better.
That was why I was so excited about Alison’s party. Alison was a girl I had met recently at school, and she accepted me immediately without thinking how weird I was because I stammered when I spoke, or making fun of my lack of social graces. I warmed to her instantly.
She was kind and generous, altogether a decent person, or so I’d thought. Until the party, the illusion wasn’t shattered, and I was glad for it. Those few weeks, they may have been the happiest of my life.
“Let’s go,” Kyle said now, grinning and taking my hand, dragging me to the car.
“You can let go now,” I grumbled peevishly, snatching my hand away from his grip. “I am perfectly capable of walking on my own, thank you.”
He laughed loudly. “Are you, though? We all know how lousy you are with people, Em. Don’t want you to turn and run away.”
I flushed and my face turned bright red. Anger sizzled through my body, but I was careful to hide it. It would only give my idiot brother another thing to tease me about.
“Shut up, Kyle.”
He slid behind the wheel and threw the car into gear, backing carefully out of the drive before screeching down the road with an ear-splitting squeal of tyres. Did I mention Kyle was a rubbish driver?
It was just getting dark by the time we reached Alison’s and hammered on her door, shivering in the cold. She opened the door immediately with a grin.
“Hey, you made it!” she squealed, hugging me tightly.
“Merry early Christmas,” I smiled back, handing her the present I had bought for her. It was wrapped in silver paper and patterned with sparkly white reindeer .
Her eyes lit up as she took the gift from my hands. “Aw, Em, you didn’t have to do that!”
I beamed at her. “You’re my friend, of course I had to. I wanted to.”
Kyle laughed. “Sorry, I didn’t get you anything. I’m not a dorky stickler for tradition like Em. You’ll have to settle with best wishes from me.”
I rolled my eyes at him, although inside I was seething. Why did Kyle have to put me down at every opportunity?
Alison didn’t seem to notice how I felt. She giggled, actually giggled at him as though she found it funny. I felt so embarrassed, I wanted to cringe for her.
“That’s cool.” She opened the door wider, stepping aside to let us past. “Come on in, guys.”
The party was already in full swing. Christmas jingles blared out from the brand new stereo on the shelf, and an electric fire blazed in the fireplace, casting holographic shadows across the ornate stonework. The table was laden with food – crisps, popcorn, dainty little sandwiches in the shape of a Christmas tree, and bowls of bright red punch with ladles for scooping.
At least twenty people were already there, and I recognised most of them from Hallow Falls High. They were mostly the snobby type, the type of people who laughed at me, who made fun of the way I dressed, the way I spoke, the way I acted. They were the kind of people I’d always hated for the way they treated me – the way they treated anybody who wasn’t on their level, acting like they were so much better than everybody.
I stuck close to Kyle, feeling self-conscious among so many people, but for some reason he seemed annoyed. “Em, will you get off my heel?” he hissed, leaning forward so nobody else would hear. “You’re seriously cramping my style here.”
I stared at him in disbelief, then turned away. “Fine,” I said, and my voice shook. “If that’s how you feel -”
“It is,” he said, not noticing my expression, and putting his foot further into the hole. “Seriously, move.”
I turned on my heel and walked away. Tears pricked the corners of my eyes. Why did it always have to be like this? Everybody ignoring me, treating me like I was invisible or like I was a pain to be around, when all I wanted was to be included.
I sat on the sofa glumly, my head in my hands, squashed between a bunch of boys who were all arguing loudly, slopping beer everywhere. Crisps crunched beneath me and I shifted with a disgusted grimace, brushing them off the sofa and onto the floor.
“Hey,” one of the boys said, leaning toward me. His breath stank of beer and I instinctively leaned away, grimacing. “Aren’t you the quiet girl? The weirdo who never talks?”
I had been about to get off the sofa to get away from them, but I couldn’t leave that insult unanswered. “I’m not a weirdo,” I said quietly, and was surprised to find that my voice was shaking.
The boy seemed to notice I was upset and he backed away, raising his hands in surrender. “Hey, don’t take it to heart. I didn’t mean to upset you.” He leaned forward conspiratorially with a wink. “For what it’s worth, people always call me a weirdo too. But me, I take it in my stride, you know what I mean?”
I wasn’t sure I did, and was about to say so, but just then, his friend bopped him on the shoulder and he turned around indignantly to bop him back, laughing uproariously. I was left to think about what he had said, about taking what people said in my stride. How could I possibly do that? It was hard enough to deal with as it was.
I sighed and slid off the sofa. I was just about ready to leave when Alison walked over to me with a grin. “Em! I just wanted to thank you for this present you got me!” I smiled, ready to say how welcome she was, when her next words took the good intentions right out of my mind. “What is it again, something you plucked out of the garbage?” I stared at her, wondering if I’d heard right. Her smile wasn’t sweet now. It was more like a malicious smirk as she insulted me again. “I couldn’t tell what it was, you see. It’s just so . . . brown, like mud. Or kinda like that goop you have for brains.”
I felt as if I was imagining things. Why was Alison, kind, sweet Alison suddenly being so horrible to me? I heard laughter explode behind me, and realised they were all laughing at me. I looked around. Everybody was laughing, even my brother was snickering so hard he was doubled over, clutching his sides. My heart ached to see it. I couldn’t stop. The tears came, fast and furious, and I ran out of the room, my sleeve clutched across my face, sobbing as if my heart would break.
​
* * *
I ran down the deserted street as the snow fell in soft flakes, slipping and skidding on the ice as I went, wanting nothing more than to get away – as far, far away as I possibly could. I heard footsteps behind, sprinting to keep up and I didn’t bother to look. I just kept on running. I didn’t want to speak to anybody just then.
“Hey! Hey you, quiet girl! Wait up!”
Again with the quiet girl? I opened my mouth to retort angrily, spinning around to face the offender, and slipped on the icy pavement, landing painfully on my side with a sickening crack.
The boy who had spoken to me on the sofa caught up to me and winced. “Oh, God. That was a nasty fall. You okay?” he asked, grabbing my hand and pulling me up.
I frowned, briefly forgetting the ache in my side. Why was this boy helping me, after I had been laughed out of Alison’s party like that? Didn’t he think I was a joke too? Didn’t everybody?
I winced and staggered against him, rubbing my ribs as pain flared through the bone where I’d hit it.
“I . . . I think so. Thanks.”
“Don’t mention it. I’m Mack, by the way. Mack Morton.”
“Emily Hale.”
He draped my arm over his shoulder and we started to walk together, Mack supporting me so I wouldn’t slip again. He frowned at me as he spoke. “You rushed out of there so quickly, didn’t you want a ride home? It’s not safe to walk in the dark, you know.”
I looked at him. “Of course I rushed out of there!” I said incredulously. Hadn’t he seen? “Everybody was making fun of me! Even my own brother thinks I’m a joke!” I felt something cold trickle down my cheeks and I realised I was crying again. “Even my brother . . .” That hurt more than anything, that Kyle would laugh at me like that instead of sticking up for me. We were twins, we were supposed to have each others’ backs! But instead he was siding with my tormentors.
Mack’s brows furrowed and I felt a sudden, uncontrollable urge to giggle, bordering on the edge of hysteria as I looked at his dark brows and thought of two giant caterpillars crawling across his face. His face was craggy and his eyes were dark and brooding. Then I looked closer and realised that his eyes were actually a brilliant shade of blue.
“I don’t understand why you put up with it,” he said finally, frowning hard. “It must get seriously annoying.”
I sighed. “It’s just . . . I don’t know what else to do. So I just let it go on and . . .” I shook my head and stared at the floor, feeling a dull thrumming in my temples. My head started to ache. “What can I do?”
He stopped walking and gripped my shoulder so that I was staring straight into his eyes, those blue, blue eyes . . . so blue it was almost hypnotic . . .
“You could always kill them.”
​
* * *
I stared at him, wondering if I’d heard right. Surely he didn’t say . . . he couldn’t . . . he couldn’t actually mean . . .
“Why don’t you kill them?” he repeated, and his blue eyes blazed brilliantly with an intense fire.
I laughed nervously and carried on walking, trying to put some distance between us. He was seriously beginning to creep me out. “Ha - you’re joking, right?”
He hadn’t moved, his piercing gaze biting into me. “I never joke about stuff like this.”
I exploded. “Mack, that’s . . . that’s crazy! I can’t go around killing people just because I don’t like them. I mean, come on. Even if I did kill them, how would I do it?” I finished with a light laugh, trying to soften the mood.
Mack shrugged, burying his hands in his pockets. “You tell me. Gun, knife, poison, the possibilities are endless.” I stared at him in shock, quite unable to move. It was like my feet were rooted to the ground. A faint feeling of nausea stirred in my stomach.
“Emily,” he said softly, moving closer to me, and I think it was the use of my full name, but I didn’t run. “You’re not really going to let those creeps push you around forever, are you? Go on. Give them a taste of what they deserve.”
I looked up at his face, trying to find a hint of a smile, searching for the tell-tale twitch that would give him away. Not a muscle shifted. Mack was deadly serious. He really meant it. He really thought I should kill them.
“But, I couldn’t . . . I mean, how . . . how would I even do it?” I asked after a pause, wondering what his response would be.
“I say a knife.” He made a cutting motion with his hands. “Nice and messy, with just the right amount of gore – shows people you’re not to be messed with or the same thing’ll happen to them.”
“No,” I responded thoughtfully, still intent on calling his bluff. “No. Not a knife. An axe . . .”
His eyes lit up and he stepped closer to me. “Yes! God, Emily, that’s perfect! Now you’re getting it!” He caught hold of my arm and began dragging me away. “Come on. I have an axe in my house. My dad uses it for chopping firewood, but he’s so scatter-brained, he’ll never miss it for a day.”
“N-no!” I spluttered and shook him off. My heart was beating fast and my breathing came quick and ragged. “Mack . . . I can’t do this! I can’t believe you’re actually serious! I could never kill one person, let alone several!”
Mack tilted his head to one side, narrowing his eyes at me. His hands were still stuffed inside his brown leather jacket. “Fine,” he said eventually. “I guess I can give you some time to think about it. But think fast, it’s Christmas tomorrow and you still gotta bring those jerks their coal delivery.” He backed away and started walking backwards, still facing me. He pointed an imaginary knife at me and pretended to swing it. “Swish. Swing. Dead. Gone,” he said, flashing me a devilish grin.
I swallowed as I watched him spin around and walk briskly back to the house.
Mack couldn’t really be serious, could he? There was no way. It was unthinkable. And yet . . . that look in his eyes when he had suggested it . . .
I shivered and hugged myself tightly. A chill that had nothing to do with the freezing cold ran up my spine. Kill my friends . . . it was impossible. It was unthinkable. And yet . . . were they really my friends? Alison had strung me along, pretending she liked me when all along she was just like the others. And my brother . . . it was obvious whose side he was on.
I felt a sharp pain in my hand and looked down. I had been clenching my fist so tightly, the nails were digging into the skin. I stared at my injured palm in wonder. So tightly clenched, I had somehow managed to draw blood.
I wondered how that blood would look spilling out of my enemies’ bodies. Would it be bright red, like this? Or dark red? Would it be thick . . . treacly . . . gushing out . . .
I grasped my head and screamed inwardly. What the hell was happening to me? These thoughts, they were so bloody and frightening. So macabre. It wasn’t like me at all!
Then again, I wondered, had the thoughts always been there? Maybe Mack’s suggestion had been what they needed to wake up and become truly alive.
Before I knew it, my footsteps had turned toward Alison’s house. Mack was standing outside, smoking. He looked up as I approached and an approving smile spread slowly across his face.
“You changed your mind.”
I willed my legs to stop shaking and set my face in an expression of grim determination. “I just thought . . . I’d . . . I’d take a look at that axe.”
He shrugged and ground the cigarette into the snow. “We can go now, if you like.”
The drive to Mack’s house was spent in tense silence, me chewing my nails and Mack staring straight ahead, not saying anything at all, those fascinating blue eyes fixed on the road.
“Here,” he muttered, pulling into a large, empty driveway. His house was a massive stone behemoth that looked as if it had been pulled straight out of the pages of an old trapper’s magazine. “It’s just round the back,” he added, pointing to show the direction he meant.
I followed him round the house, looking up at the snow settling gently on the roof. It was a dark, moonless night. There were no streetlights where Mack lived, near the forest, so the only light came from our phone torches.
“Here we are,” his voice came suddenly out of the darkness and I yelped as I bumped into him. He smiled down at me. He was hefting a large woodcutters’ axe in his hands. The handle was long and wooden, the blade was sharp and polished, and gleamed wickedly in the torchlight.
I took it gingerly from him, wincing as the blade nicked my thumb. I sucked the blood away and stared at the axe. It was so heavy, so sharp, so . . . perfect.
“You like it?” he asked.
“It’s beautiful,” I murmured, caressing the blade where I had cut my thumb, relishing the sting I felt as it cut again into my skin. I glanced up at Mack who was watching me with a smile creasing his craggy features. “You think this’ll work?”
“She sure is a beaut. Look at your thumb,” he pointed out. “Just the slightest nick made it bleed like that. You try pushing that through someone’s neck, see how smooth it goes.”
A grin spread across my face and I couldn’t resist a teasing swing of the axe. Mack flinched away and I laughed at the sudden, terrified expression on his face.
“What are you scared for?” I asked, smirking. I had no idea he was such a wimp! “I have no quarrel with you.”
“Yeah, hah,” he chuckled nervously, ducking again as I swung for the second time. “I’d hate to imagine what would happen to me if I did.”
“I can tell you,” I murmured softly, as if in a dream. “Dead. Gone. Remember?”
He grimaced and I wondered what exactly was going through his head at that moment. “Emily . . . I think you should give that back to me now,” he said cautiously, holding out his hands for the axe and flinching as if he was afraid I might strike him with it.
“What are you afraid of?” I laughed and handed him the axe. “Did you honestly think I was going to refuse to let the axe go? Reign in that imagination, Morton.”
He laughed shakily. His face was pale as he shucked the axe back into place.
“There.” His hands were shaking and he didn’t meet my eyes as he spoke. “C’mon. I’ll drive you home.”
My eyes narrowed as he slid into the car and started the engine. I looked sideways at the shed, thinking hard. The axe . . . I would need it for the plan that had already begun to form in my head. Mack’s house wasn’t far, and now I knew where he lived. I could always come back for it later.
I really hoped Mack wasn’t going to wimp out, not after he’d got me all fired up. But as I watched his legs shaking as he drove, I wasn’t so sure he was such a worthy ally anymore. He seemed like the kind of guy that acted tough then wimped out at the crucial moment. I didn’t need someone like that around. But I couldn't do this alone.
I looked up with a start as the squeal of brakes interrupted my thoughts. We had reached my house, the silver-white fairy lights twinkling in the pitch-black of the night.
“Thanks for the ride,” I said with a smile, getting out of the car. “Merry Christmas.”
He smiled but didn’t say anything, driving off the second the car door clicked shut, the black Volvo slipping and skidding down the icy road with a screech of tyres. I stared after him.
Damn you, Mack. Don’t you know how much I need you right now?
​
* * *
I snuck out that night – the night before Christmas, when everybody had gone to bed and the ornaments gleamed beautifully in the moonlight.
Tinsel shone silver and gold and the tree was decked out with homemade baubles, my brother’s signature scrawl decorating several of them. Kyle was always so talented. He really was. I stared up at the tree, smiling briefly, and stopped to admire it as I passed, touching it for luck.
But it seemed my luck was holding. Upstairs, while my parents slept, Kyle, his bedsheets wrapped tightly around his neck, was already on his way to hell, after he had put me through it. It was the least he deserved. A quick death at least – a small token of thanks for being my brother, however rubbish he had been at that.
“Enjoy the eternal quiet, Kyle, Finally, you’ll find out what it’s like to be me,” I whispered, even though I knew he couldn’t hear me.
The door clicked shut behind me as I stepped confidently out into the night. It was amazing. I felt really good, great in fact. I felt confident for the first time in ages. I restrained the whoop of joy that threatened to burst out and give me away. I had won! For the first time in my life, I had beaten Kyle at his own game! It felt so good, so good to be alive!
The freshly fallen snow crunched pleasantly beneath my feet as I made my way to the car, which lay huddled under a blanket of snow.
I grabbed for the brush and cleared the snow off, before starting the shabby little Citroen’s engine and backing out of the driveway, taking care to keep the headlights off. My parents’ bedroom faced the drive - they would see me leave if I wasn’t careful. And I couldn’t leave behind any trace of my deed.
The party was still going strong at Alison’s, and I smiled to myself as I passed the house, on my way to Mack’s. All the lights were out in his – either no one was home or everybody was asleep. Either way, I wasn’t going to complain.
The shed door stood wide open, swaying slightly on its hinges in the gentle Arctic breeze. I snuck cautiously in and grabbed the axe which lay tantalisingly on its side, inviting me, calling to me. Bless you, Mack, I thought, smiling to myself. Thanks to him, I was able to put things into perspective. I finally saw what I needed to do, what I had wanted to do all along.
Cruising back past Alison’s house, I could hear raucous music spilling out onto the street. Silhouettes danced behind the curtains, and I, sitting in the car behind the wheel, hefted the sharp, sharp axe in my hands.
“Party time, friends,” I whispered grimly and smiled.
I got out of the car and knocked loudly on the door. Alison opened the door and grimaced when she saw me. “Hey, didn’t you leave like several hours ago?”
I nodded, the axe hidden carefully behind my back. “Yes, but I realise now how stupid I was to leave such a great party.” I tilted my head to one side, a slow smile spreading across my face. My ears were thundering with the blood rush and I could feel the adrenaline pumping in my veins. I was dying, just dying to get this party going.
Come on, Alison. Let me in so I can paint the walls red with your blood. Let me in so I plaster your entrails as decorations. Let’s us both have a bloody, bloody Christmas.
“Come on, Al,” I wheedled. “We’re friends. Aren’t you going to let me in?”
She scowled at me, her arms folded, leaning against the door so I couldn’t slip past her. “Friends? Friends? You’re kidding me. Did you not get the hint, or are you actually thick? You’re not welcome here anymore.”
“Yeah,” I said slowly, my voice hardening as the anger I had been suppressing grew. “About that, did you enjoy stringing me along all these weeks just so you could tread me down into the ground?”
She laughed, her long blonde hair swinging as she tossed her head arrogantly, pale green eyes flashing. “Yeah, actually. I did it on a dare. Won me twenty bucks, and it was a lot of fun, too! I’ve really enjoyed stringing you along all these weeks.” She doubled up hysterically, laughing, pointing at me. “Your expression! Your expression when you realised somebody didn’t think you were a pathetic weirdo! God, you’re such a loser! You actually believed I liked you! Sorry, Em, but you’re just so easy!” She laughed again.
The anger reached fever pitch, and I saw red. When it came to it, I didn’t even think. It really was as simple a matter as Mack said. I raised the axe, and I swung.
Swing. Swish. Dead. Gone.
Alison didn’t even have time to scream as the blade arced toward her. Blood spewed as her arteries ruptured. It was over very quickly.
I stared down at her prone form. I didn’t feel happy . . . but I didn’t feel sad, either.
I felt . . . exhilarated. That was it. I was exhilarated. It was a novel sensation. I enjoyed it. But I wanted more. I wanted so much more. I wanted to see tears. I wanted them to cry. I wanted them to beg, beg for mercy so I could deny them and watch them scream as they died, slowly, in unbearable agony. I wanted to see them swimming in a bloodbath of my creation. I wanted to kill them. I wanted to kill them all, every last one of the creeps who had made my life a misery.
Suddenly, Alison twitched. She was still alive? Well, that was too bad for her. I grimaced and raised the axe without a thought, bringing it down hard. Again and again and again. Until she was nothing more than a bloody pile of pulp and guts. I stopped to catch my breath and shook my head, almost feeling sad for what could have been if only Alison hadn’t been such a two-faced cow.
“Should’ve stayed put,” I muttered.
So heavy . . . the axe was so much heavier than I had thought it would be. I looked at Alison and made a face. She may have been pretty enough in life but she certainly wasn’t much to look at now. Bloody. . . trampled . . . rotten . . . just like her heart, laid bare for everyone to see.
I sidestepped the bloody mess on the polished hall floor that had once been Alison Peters and stepped inside, pulling the door quietly shut behind me. The music was still going strong. Apparently, nobody had heard me strike her over the noise of the party, and I thanked my lucky stars for that.
I made my way down the hallway towards the last room before the kitchen – the living room – where everybody was gathered. I chuckled to myself, hugging the blood-spattered axe close to my chest. It was going to be a massacre. A crimson massacre.
“Knock, knock!” I giggled, rapping gently at the doorframe. The dancing stopped. One, two, then everybody’s heads turned towards me, taking in my blood-splattered clothes, and the axe, coated deep red with Alison’s blood.
There was silence for a moment.
Then the screaming started.
And the laughing. It took me a while to realise that I was the one laughing. Hysterically. Laughing, over and over as I swung, slashed, cut. Blood streaked the walls scarlet, glinted off the sparkling baubles, and dripped off the tree, softly plipping down to the carpet below.
As cheerful X-massy jingles played, I murdered. I swung and I slashed, tearing my former tormentors apart in a thrilling explosion of blood and guts. I didn’t, couldn’t stop, until a horrified voice suddenly broke into my blood-spattered haze.
“Emily! Emily, stop! Are you . . . are you insane?”
I stopped chopping Keean Johnson’s arm off with a start and grinned happily as I saw him. “Mack!” I cried. “You came! Come look! Look at what I’ve done! Isn’t it amazing? Isn’t it a thing of beauty?”
He looked horrified. His mouth was hanging open, and his craggy face was bleached white. He looked like he was about to be sick.
“Emily,” he whispered, putting his hand slowly to his mouth. “My God, Emily. What . . . what have you done?”
I frowned, genuinely confused. The blood-splattered axe hung limply from my hands. My clothes, thoroughly drenched with the blood of my victims, stuck uncomfortably to my body, clinging tightly to my trembling limbs.
“What do you mean? It was your idea. I did it, just like you said. Aren’t you happy?” I asked tenderly, stepping closer to him, reaching out to him, the one who had inspired me, the one who had made me happy, the one who had told me to strike back against my tormentors, the one I had obeyed.
He backed slowly away from me, and to my shock, I realised that tears were steadily streaking a path down his cheeks.
“Damn it, Em!” he spluttered. “It was a joke! It was all a joke! I thought you knew that! I never meant for it to go so far! I never meant for you to do . . .” he choked as he looked around at the dead bodies of his friends, severed limbs strewn across the carpet and furniture, blood gleaming off the festive ornaments, the mauve contents of the upturned punch bowl dripping softly off the table with a sickening plop. “. . . this.”
“But I wanted it,” I said stiffly. What was wrong with him? Why was Mack saying these things to me? Why now, after he had inspired me to do all this? I didn’t want to hurt him, not really. But I could feel the anger rising steadily inside me. It was red hot, scalding, bubbling inside my body. I had to let it out somehow.
As if in a dream, I began to raise the axe above my head. “I wanted it all along,” I muttered, my reason steadily disappearing behind a red mist of fury. “To get revenge on everybody who ever mocked me. You helped me realise that, Mack. You helped me realise how much they deserved it. But now you’re backing out too. I guess I should’ve expected it. You were just like everybody else. Just like them, you were stringing me along all the time, weren’t you? And since I can’t have any witnesses, I’m sorry, but now you have to go too.”
“Emily,” he said softly, and he was sobbing gently now, overcome with guilt, with grief. “I’m sorry, so sorry that I didn’t realise how disturbed you had become. You have no idea how bad I feel about this.” He started to walk forward slowly, coming closer to me, his hands raised in surrender. “Please, put the axe down. You’re sick, Emily. You need help.”
“I need help!” I screamed furiously, raising the axe still higher, preparing to strike. “I need help! It was you! You who suggested it to me! You who told me to kill everybody who had ever been mean to me! And now you’re blaming me! You’re saying I’m insane! Well, I’m not! I’m not!”
I brought the axe down hard. I let out an angry cry as he dodged sideways, the blade missing him by a hair’s breadth. The next second I cried out as Mack launched himself at me, knocking me off my feet. The axe flew out of my hand, wedging itself in the brown leather sofa, painted red with Gina Alcox’s blood. I stumbled backwards, tripping over the hearth rug and falling into a grotesque tangle of entrails with a disgusting squelch of squished guts.
I screamed as Mack dug his knees firmly into my sides and gripped my shoulders, pinning me to the floor. I bit and fought, swearing, screaming, struggling to get free.
“Let me go!” I shrieked, thrashing wildly beneath him. “Let me go! I swear, I’m going to kill you, Mack Morton! I will! I will!”
“Hush, Emily,” he said softly, stroking my cheek as I stiffened underneath him. “It’s going to be okay. I promise.”
I sagged in defeat as I heard the sirens wailing, roaring up the drive. Red and blue flashing lights washed through the blood-soaked room. I felt Mack relax against me with a sigh of relief.
“They’re here,” he murmured. “The police are here.”
I felt hot, salty tears roll down my face. It was ruined. Everything was ruined. My revenge would never be complete now.
“Don’t cry,” Mack said tenderly, wiping my tears away. “We’ll get you the help you need, Emily. I promise.”
I closed my eyes and laid my head back, sobbing gently as Mack rocked me in his arms and comforted me.
“It’s Christmas now, you know?” he said softly, staring out of the window as so many feet thundered into the house and down the blood-drenched hallway. I could hear the church bell ringing vaguely in the distance. He sighed, a faint smile playing across his lips as he rocked me back and forth, calming me, wiping away my tears. “It’s just gone midnight.”
“Is this your present?” I asked him, choking back my tears. “To ruin my perfect revenge? To lock me up in the psych ward for the rest of my life?”
“No,” he said softly, looking me in the eyes. “I was going to get your brother back for you. But not with murder.”
I sighed and let my head rest in the crook of his arm. “I already did that, didn’t I?”
“Yeah,” he murmured as the police burst in, followed by four more men, from the psych ward, I guessed with an exhausted exhale of breath. Well, let them take me. I was ready for them. I was too tired to put up anymore of a fight.
“Oh, God,” the leading officer gasped, gagging and clamping his hand over his mouth, as he took in the carnage. “Oh, dear God.”
“It’s okay,” Mack said softly, as the men leant to take me away. “She won’t put up a fight now, will you, Em?”
I smiled up at him, feeling truly happy for the first time in a long while. “Why should I? After all, it’s Christmas.”
DAWNING HORROR
(Released for Halloween 2023)
​
Raven flying high through the sky
Raven flying through the woods at night
Raven pecking at shrouds on the ground
Raven flying, flying, flying
On high in the sky
Sharp talons
Sharp claws
Landing
Landing
Landing
Falling
Falling
Falling
Tearing flesh,
Rotting meat,
Where’s the raven gone,
Where’s the raven gone,
Who’s the girl done come when raven gone?
Raven tear, raven come, raven eat, raven gone,
Hide, hide, hide
Away
Away, away, away
Raven come, raven gone,
Raven girl on hill over nigh’ come
Lock your windows, shut your doors
Ain’t no more to do because raven girl’s goin’ to get you
What you goin’ to do . . .
. . . when raven girl comes to get you?
--------------------------------------------------------
Audrey could remember it, as clear as the sky on a cloudless day – the day she met the raven girl.
That day she had been in a bad mood. Everything that could go wrong had. She had forgotten her backpack, had to stomp all the way back to get it, missed the bus, and it started to rain. Heavily. It was still raining when the first class started, as she stared morosely out of the window, wondering how a day that had started with such promise could have gone so badly wrong.
And that was when she saw her.
The raven girl.
She wasn’t sure what she was seeing at first – some optical illusion because of the rain? It made everything blurry and hard to see. She rubbed her eyes and blinked. No, the silhouette had a definite shape to it. A young child . . . a girl?
Quite suddenly a flash of lightening illuminated the schoolyard, and Audrey caught a clear glimpse of the vision. That single glimpse was enough to strike a terrible fear into her heart. It was a girl, quite young – maybe even younger than her, with lamp-like eyes and jet black hair pulled into two long pigtails. A raven sat perched on her shoulder, its coal black eyes boring into the very depths of Audrey’s soul.
Neither apparition moved, staring directly at Audrey who sat frozen, quite unable to move, until the lightening flashed again, and they were gone. Audrey sat shivering in her seat, hoping against hope that she had merely hallucinated the vision, but knowing, knowing it was a futile hope.
Audrey had heard the stories about the raven girl, of course. Everybody had – Jarrow was a small town after all. Word spread quickly. It was why she was afraid. Because she knew what was coming. People said that if you saw the raven girl, it meant terrible things, it meant that bad luck was sure to come your way. She was an omen, they said, an omen of death. Its harbinger. Perhaps she was death itself. Nobody could be sure – the stories varied from person to person. Everybody agreed on one thing, though.
Nobody saw the raven girl and lived to tell the tale.
And now Audrey had seen her.
She was going to die. Oh God, she was going to die.
​
* * *
“You saw her? You actually saw her?” Kirie, Audrey’s best friend exclaimed excitedly, shaking her head in envious disbelief, her long blonde hair tumbling over her face in her excitement. She brushed it back impatiently, her warm brown eyes sparkling. “Oh my God, you are sooo lucky! I’ve been watching out for that girl my whole life and you just see her like that!”
“God, Kirie, this isn’t a joke!” Audrey snapped. “Don’t you realise what this means?”
“Yeah, yeah,” Kirie waved her hand dismissively. “You’re going to die. Personally, I don’t believe that tosh. Yeah, maybe she’s bad luck, but I think that’s because people have associated it with her. You know, like how ravens are considered ill omens and such but they’re really not.” She shrugged. “Even black cats. People just need a scapegoat to pin their rotten luck onto and she just happened to be it.”
Audrey sighed and took a tentative sip of her juice. “Maybe . . . but there’s always a reason behind stories, isn’t there? Those tales, all of those horrible legends behind her . . . they had to originate from somewhere.”
Kirie nodded and leaned back in her chair, reaching for her book bag and tugging it by the strap so that it landed with a careless bang on the table.
“Yeah – and I think I may have found the source.”
Audrey raised a questioning eyebrow. Kirie smiled.
“Okay, you know how we have to do a project on something of historical interest in this town? Well, I picked my project to be about the raven girl. I wanted to find out more, and I found a whole lot. For one thing, have you noticed how she always appears around Jarrow forest? Okay, I haven’t seen her myself, but most eyewitnesses have corroborated that statement as fact.”
Audrey shrugged and chugged down the rest of her juice. “Okay, that’s fine, but what about today? She appeared -” pointing, “- right in the freaking schoolyard. How do you explain that?”
Kirie opened her mouth and then shut it again, momentarily lost for words.
“Fair point,” she said finally. “But -” raising a finger, “the Jarrow forest and its connecting estate is a definite link. Maybe she was a real girl who lived there once, maybe she was the founder’s daughter? I heard she died mysteriously and the death was quickly hushed up – but I’ll bet there’s newspaper reports from the time. I have a few in my bag – incredible stuff, and you won’t believe . . .” She stopped and tapped her nose with a grin. “Well, you’ll find out when I present my project to the class. Either way, there’s definitely a mystery there and I’m dying to solve it. I was actually planning on checking it out myself after school today, but it would be a whole lot more interesting if you came along for the ride too.”
“Oh, no. No, no, no. There is no way in hell you are dragging me into this!” Audrey spluttered. “I’m already rattled enough! Isn’t it bad enough I saw her once in my lifetime without running the risk of seeing her twice?! I value my life way too much, Kirie, so you can just forget about it! I’m sorry, but you’re on your own here.”
Kirie looked disappointed as she gathered up her things.
“I guess I kind of thought it would be fun. But I get it. You’re scared. Fair enough. If that’s how you feel -” She sighed and shrugged listlessly. “- I won’t press you.”
She shouldered her bag and left the room without a backwards glance as the bell rang, signalling the end of lunch. Audrey stared after her, feeling vaguely guilty. But, she argued with her conscience, shouldn’t my life come first over the happiness of my best friend?
Somehow, she couldn’t bring herself to agree. But her fear won over. That afternoon, she watched Kirie walk away towards the isolated part of town with a sinking feeling in her heart.
Just what was Kirie getting herself into?
​
* * *
Kirie would never in a million years admit it to Audrey, but she was afraid. Dreadfully afraid. The woods were eerie and much too large for one girl, the trees lurching sinisterly on either side as if trying to grab hold of her. The weather, already dreary and desolate, had grown steadily worse since she had crossed the threshold to enter the forest. The wind howled and moaned, the trees swaying dangerously as heavy Arctic gusts buffeted the slim trunks from side to side.
Kirie held tightly to the hood of her waterproof jacket to stop it blowing off her head, and shivered. Despite the warm fleece lining, an icy chill still managed to make its way inside her clothing, chilling her to the bone. A sudden feeling like cold water trickling down her spine which grew steadily worse the deeper she walked into the forest, caused her breath to rattle fearfully in her chest.
She stopped and took a deep breath. How she wished Audrey was with her right now. She could have used the company. Maybe she could still get her to come along if she begged hard enough . . .
She put her hand in her pocket and checked her phone. Zero bars. She clapped a hand to her head and cursed silently. Of course. Why had she even expected there to be reception? Jarrow was right in the middle of nowhere and where she was standing, she was already in the thick of the forest.
She was on her own.
She tucked her phone away and carried on walking, reading aloud from her notebook as she walked, thinking hard, determined to distract herself from her unsettling surroundings.
“Excerpt from the Jarrow Times – May 1836: ‘Penny Jarrow – daughter of the late Percival Jarrow, founder of the town of Jarrow – was found dead in the forest where the trees grew the thickest so not a sound could escape and none would have witnessed her terrible demise. The look on her face was pure horror and the ravens were pecking away at her body’. Good God, that’s horrible,” she murmured, sickened.
“‘The sight was so grotesque that none who laid eyes on her could avoid becoming violently sick. Over the coming weeks, those who had witnessed the gruesome sight were overcome with a mysterious sickness that rotted the bones and fouled away the hair. Percival Jarrow was the first to succumb, followed closely by his wife and remaining offspring. The policemen who had been called to the scene on that dreadful day died last of all. On death, very little remained of the bodies while ravens pecked away at the rest.
“‘While officially the deaths have been attributed to a localised outbreak of the Plague, many townsfolk prefer to believe a more fantastic explanation – that of occultic rituals and a belief in Satan, which goes against the teachings of the church, but is no doubt a pleasing notion to the minds of the layfolk. A priest has been called in as a precaution to bless the affected homes. Further reports are eagerly anticipated’.
“Incredible,” she sighed, looking up thoughtfully - then, as she caught sight of the rapidly blackening sky, and the growing darkness of the forest, immediately regretted it and turned back to her notes. “That’s all very well, but how does the death of that girl connect to the sickness of those people and link in to the legend today?” She frowned and scratched her chin. “The only common denominator I can see are the ravens and Jarrow. But other than that, I don’t understand any of this. What am I missing? What’s the link between the ravens, the forest and little Penny Jarrow?”
She threw her hands up in frustration, dropping the notebook in her fury.
“Argh! I’m completely stumped! And it’s already getting dark too! Mom will kill me if I don’t turn back now.” She sighed wearily. “I guess I can look forward to failing this class.”
She bent to pick up the fallen notebook, when a strange sound came to her ears, the feeling of cold water trickling down her back intensified, and her hand stopped on its way to the book. She looked up slowly, dreading what she was about to see, and her eyes opened wide in horror. Her mouth opened in a silent scream, before something swooped over her and her vision went black.
​
* * *
Audrey ran her hands nervously through her dark hair for what seemed like the millionth time that day. Worry creased her features.
I should’ve gone with Kirie . . . shouldn’t have let her walk through that damned forest alone . . . she hasn’t answered any of my messages or calls. What if she’s hurt, how would we ever know . . . what if . . . what if . . .
She sighed and picked up her phone for the thousandth time and speed dialled her best friend. Again, the call didn’t even ring, going directly to the answering machine.
Was Kirie still in the forest? She nudged the curtain aside and squinted. She could just see Jarrow forest from her window, a dark blotch in the distance draped in shadow, past the dim lights of the town, a permanent stain on the scenery. It was the darkest spot there. The sun had long since set.
She ran her hands through her hair again.
“Oh man. Kirie, you stubborn little . . .” she muttered, pacing up and down. “Call me, you idiot. Let me know you’re okay, goddamn it.”
“Audrey!” her mother’s voice called up the stairs. “Come down for supper!”
She groaned aloud.
Now?
How could the timing possibly be worse?
“In a second, mom! I have something I have to do first!”
“You can do it after you’ve eaten! Come down! Now! That is an order!”
‘The number you have dialled is not in service.’
She swore and flung the phone across the room.
“Damn it! Kirie, where are you?!”
​
* * *
Audrey.
Audrey.
C’mon, Audrey. Where are you?
Don’t leave me like this.
​
* * *
Audrey woke with a start, Kirie’s voice echoing in her ears, as real as if her friend had been right beside her. She sat still for a moment, hardly daring to breathe, listening, wondering if she really had heard Kirie, if that had really been her friend’s voice . . . and if she was still out there, alone . . .
“Kirie . . .” she whispered. “Are you there?”
Nothing.
“Come on, Kirie. Answer me.”
Silence. She bit her lip. Maybe if she tried something that held a special meaning for them both, a trigger word, so to speak – she could reopen the connection she had been so certain she had just experienced.
“Peewee! Remember that? Peewee, Kirie. Come on, don’t tell me you’ve forgotten. Peewee.” She paused and listened hopefully. “Do you hear me, Kirie? Do you?”
Nothing.
Then -
Audrey? Is that you?
She gasped.
“Kirie! How . . . how are you doing this?”
I . . . I have no idea. I don’t even know where I am. Call me crazy, but heck, I don’t even know what I am or what’s going on anymore.
Audrey’s voice trembled as she spoke. “What do you mean? What are you talking about?”
I don’t know.
Scared . . .
. . . frightened . . .
. . . ost . . .
. . . al . . . one . . . help . . . help . . . help . . .
“Kirie, what’s going on?”
Raven flying high through the sky
Raven flying through the woods at night
Raven pecking at shrouds on the ground
Sharp talons
Sharp claws
Tearing flesh,
Rotting meat,
Where’s the raven gone,
Where’s the raven gone?
Raven tear, raven come, raven eat, raven gone,
Hide, hide, hide
Away, away, away
Raven come, raven gone,
Raven girl in forest over nigh’ come
Lock your windows, shut your doors
Ain’t nothing more to do because raven girl’s goin’ to get you
What you goin’ to do . . .
. . . when raven girl comes to get you?
Audrey gasped and opened her eyes, the terrible schoolyard chant ringing in her ears. She remembered it all too well, the ominous words kids would sing as they skipped to the beat of the rope. The words everybody knew, young and old . . . the words she heard in her nightmares . . .
“Kirie, what the hell was that?”
“Come on, answer me, please!”
“Kirie!!!”
​
* * *
Raven come, raven gone,
Raven girl in forest over nigh’ come
Lock your windows, shut your doors
Ain’t no more to do because raven girl’s goin’ to get you
What you goin’ to do . . .
. . . when raven girl comes to get you?
​
* * *
They found Kirie’s ravaged body the following morning, so brutally torn apart the only way to identify her was by the teeth that lay scattered around her bloodied body. It looked as if some wild animal had torn her apart in a frenzy of bloodlust.
But Audrey knew better. The raven girl had come for Kirie. Kirie had looked for her, and now she was gone. She felt too numb to even cry. All she could do was sit by the window, staring bleakly out over the dark expanse of Jarrow forest.
A single tear dropped from her eye and trailed a path down her cheek. Why, why had she refused to go with her? She could have saved her. She could have stopped her. She could have done so much. And now Kirie was dead. And it was all her fault. All her fault.
“Kirie . . .” she murmured helplessly, wishing that just by saying the words, she could put things right. “Why . . . why you? What was it? What did you do?”
Try as she might, she could not think of a logical explanation why the raven girl would have wanted Kirie dead. It had been Audrey who had seen her after all, not Kirie. All Kirie had done was dig up some research about the old legend-
“Research.” She gasped and stood up suddenly, knocking her chair over in her hurry. “Kirie said she found out something incredible. What was it? What did Kirie find that was so terrible she had to die for it?” She seized her bag and rushed out of the room.
​
* * *
“Raven girl?” The librarian frowned so hard that her glasses, perched precariously on the bridge of her nose, fell off. “Yes, we have information about the legend, but what do you want to go digging up the past for?”
“I . . . it’s research,” Audrey fibbed. “For a school project on the town’s history, you know.”
“Ah, I remember. Seems like you’re not the first one to come asking me that.” The librarian began tapping away on the keyboard, her eyes never leaving Audrey’s face. “That girl, the one with the . . . blonde hair, was it? She was in here just last week asking the same thing.”
Audrey stiffened. Kirie.
“I’d like to take out whatever she took out,” she said on impulse. “Books, old newspapers, whatever it was she borrowed.”
The librarian made a face. “You sure? Some of it makes for pretty gory reading.” Then, when Audrey showed no sign of moving, she sighed and got up with a weary creak of old bones. “Alright. But don’t say I didn’t warn you.” She began rummaging through the Returns shelf. “She only returned the books, though. The newspapers, she photocopied and took the copies with her.”
“Can I see them?” Audrey asked.
The woman grimaced sympathetically. “Afraid not. They were on loan from the Jarrow archives and . . . the loan just expired. They’re already on their way back, I’m sorry.” Seeing that Audrey looked downcast, she added, “But why not ask your friend to make a copy for you? I’m sure if you ask -”
“Thank you,” Audrey murmured. “Unfortunately, that’s no longer an option.” The librarian stared at her, not understanding. Audrey felt sudden tears prick her eyes and turned away hastily, not wanting the librarian to see. She picked up the books the librarian had just scanned for her and rushed out with a strangled sob.
As she sat in the park, rummaging through the books Kirie had once held, she could almost hear her friend’s voice echoing in her head, giving a cheerful commentary as she flipped through the books.
“That’s Percival Jarrow’s biography – did you know he was into the occult? Seriously cool. Oh, and that there, that’s a complete collection of every raven girl legend ever created. It’s mostly a lot of hoaxes, but it’s interesting reading. And I would not recommend reading it at night.” Kirie’s laugh, merry and tinkling, sounded in her ear. Audrey leapt up with a cry and clamped her hands over her ears.
What the hell was wrong with her? Why was she hearing Kirie’s voice now? Kirie was dead. She was dead. Why did she have to keep suffering? Why did she have to keep hearing her? She didn’t want to hear Kirie’s voice. It was far too painful for her to deal with.
“Something wrong, Aud?” Kirie’s voice, concerned, echoed in her head. “You look like you’re gonna throw up. I’d stay away from lunch, if I were you.” She laughed again – a friendly laugh, but Audrey flinched as if she had been shot. Leaving the books behind, she started to run. “No use running, Audrey! I’m in your head and I’m not going anywhere.”
Why did Kirie’s voice suddenly sound so mean? So bitter, so . . . cruel?
“Do you want to know how I died?” Kirie’s voice carried on relentlessly, the cheerful edge now completely gone. Her voice seethed with malice. “Well, how about I show you instead? It’s much more interesting that way.”
Audrey looked up with a gasp and forced herself to stop running, realising with a jolt of horror that she had somehow ended up in Jarrow forest.
This was not good, not good at all. She had to get out of here, fast, before whatever killed Kirie came back for her.
“Ain’t no running goin’ to do you no good!” Kirie’s voice, so malicious, so gloating, sang out. “Because raven girl’s going to find you, wherever you go.”
Audrey heard a loud screech and gasped, her heart thundering with fear. She had to move, had to run, had to get out of there, but her feet wouldn’t obey her.
She screamed as the black shadow that had claimed Kirie fell across her face and talons raked across her skin, drawing blood.
“Help!” she cried desperately.
“Ain’t nobody goin’ to hear you,” the voice sang softly, taunting her. “Look out, look out, because Raven girl’s goin’ to get you.”
Audrey closed her eyes and screamed and screamed.