by Brian Lumley
“Oh my God!” Jordan gasped. Newton saw the look on Jordan’s face, forgot the thing he thought he had seen, turned to watch the death agonies of the incandescent dog.
Vlad’s blackened body throbbed and vibrated, burst open, put up a nest of tentacles that twined like alien fingers four or five feet into the air. Mouthing obscenities, eyes bulging, Gower hosed the thing down with fire. The tentacles steamed, blistered and collapsed but the dog’s body continued to pulsate.
“Jesus Christ!” Jordan moaned his horror. “He changed the dog too!” He unhooked a cleaver form his belt, moved forward, shielded his eyes against the blaze and severed Vlad’s head from his body with one single clean stroke.
Jordan backed off, shouted at Gower: “You finish it—make sure you finish it! I heard Roberts’s whistle just now. Harvey and me will go on in.”
As Gower continued to burn the remains of the dog-thing, Jordan and Newton went stumbling through smoke and reek to the rear wall of the house, where they found an open window. They looked at each other, then licked their lips nervously in unison. Both of them were breathing raggedly of the sodden, stinking air.
“Come on,” said Jordan. “Cover me.” He aimed his crossbow in front of him, swung his leg across the window sill …
In the barn Ben Trask pulled up short, his square face alert, ears attentive to the silence. The silence said there was no one here, but it was lying. Trask knew it as surely as if he sat behind a one-way window and listened in on an important interrogation by police of big-time criminals. The picture here was false, a lie.
Old farm implements were strewn everywhere. The mist, billowing in through the open ends of the building, had turned old steel slick with a sort of metallic sweat; chains and worn tyres hung from hooks in the walls; a stack of tongue-and-groove boards teetered uncertainly, as if recently disturbed. Then Trask saw the wooden steps ascending into gloom, and at the same time a single stem of straw where it came drifting down.
He drew air in a sharp gasp, turned his face and crossbow up towards the badly gapped boarding overhead—and was just in time to see a woman’s insanely working face framed there, and hear her hiss of triumph as she launched a pitchfork at him! Trask had no time to aim but simply pulled the trigger.
The pitchfork’s sharp offside tine missed him but its twin scraped under his collar bone and passed through his right shoulder, driving him down and backwards. At the same time there came a mad, babbling shriek to end all shrieks, and Anne Lake crashed through rotten boards in a cloud of dust and powdery straw. She landed square on her back, with Trask’s bolt sticking out of her chest dead centre. The bolt alone should have done for her, and the fall certainly, but she was no longer entirely human.
Trask lay against the side wall and tried to pull the pitchfork out of his shoulder. There was no strength in him; he couldn’t do it; pain and shock had left him weak as a kitten. He could only watch and try to keep from blacking out as Yulian Bodescu’s “auntie” crept towards him on all fours, grabbed the pitchfork and yanked it viciously free. And then Trask did black out.
Anne Lake drew back the pitchfork, growling like a big cat as she aimed it at Trask’s heart. Behind her, Guy Roberts grabbed the fork’s wooden handle, hauled on it and threw her off balance. She howled her frustration, fell on her back again, grasped the bolt in her chest with both hands and tried to draw it out. Roberts, impeded by the apparatus on his back, lumbered by her, took hold of Trask by the front of his jacket and somehow managed to drag him clear of the barn. Then he turned back, aimed his hose, and applied a firm and steady pressure to the trigger.
The barn was at once transformed into a gigantic oven; heat and fire and smoke filled it floor to tiled roof, spilling out of its open ends. And in the middle of it all something screamed and screamed, a wildly hissing, rising scream that finally shut itself off as the upper floor collapsed and tipped blazing hay down into the roaring inferno. And still Roberts kept his finger on the trigger, until he knew that nothing—nothing—could have survived in there …
At the back of the house Ken Layard found Gower burning Vlad. Jordan had just stepped in through the open window and Newton was about to follow him. “Hold it!” Layard shouted. “You can’t work two crossbows together!” He came forward. “I’ll go in this way,” he told Newton, “with Jordan. You stick with Gower and go round the front. Go now!”
As Layard clambered awkwardly in through the window, Newton dragged Gower away from the cindered, smoking thing that had been Vlad and jerked his thumb towards the far corner of the house. “That thing’s finished,” he shouted, “so now get a grip of yourself! Come on—the others will be inside by now.”
They quickly made their way through the mist-wreathed gardens on the south side of the house, and saw Roberts turn away from the blazing barn and drag Trask out of the danger area. Roberts saw them, yelled: “What the hell’s going on?”
“Gower burned the dog,” Newton yelled back. “Except it wasn’t … wasn’t a dog—not any more!”
Roberts’s lips drew back from his teeth in a half-snarl, half-grimace. “We got Anne Lake,” he said, as Newton and Gower came closer. “And, of course, she wasn’t all woman! Where’re Layard and Jordan?”
“Inside,” said Gower. He was shaking, rivered in sweat. “And it’s not finished yet, Guy. Not yet. There’s more to come!”
“I’ve tried scanning the house,” Roberts said. “Nothing! Just a fog in there. A mental fucking fog! Pointless trying, anyway. Too damned much going on!” He grabbed Gower. “You OK?”
Gower nodded. “I think so.”
“Right. Now listen. Thermite bombs in the truck; plastic explosive, too, in haversacks. Dump ‘em in the cellars. Spread ’em out. Try to take ’em all down in one go. And no torching while you’re holding the stuff! In fact get out of that kit and take a crossbow like Newton. The stuff’s all set to go off from excessive heat or naked flame. Plant it and get out—and then stay out! Three of us in the house itself should be enough. If not—the fire will be.”
“You’re going in there?” Gower looked at the house, licked his lips.
“I’m going in, yes,” Roberts nodded. “There’s still Bodescu, his mother and the girl to account for. And don’t worry about me. Worry about yourself. The cellars could be far worse than the house.” He headed for the open door under the columned portico …
Chapter Fourteen
INSIDE THE HOUSE, LAYARD AND JORDAN HAD CAREFULLY, systematically searched the ground floor and now approached the main staircase to the upper levels. They’d switched on dim lights as they went, compensating a little for the gloom. At the foot of the stairs they paused.
“Where the hell is Roberts?” Layard whispered. “We could use some instructions.”
“Why?” Jordan glanced at him out of the corner of his eye. “We know what we’re up against—mainly. And we know what to do.”
“But there should be four of us in here.”
Jordan gritted his teeth. “There was something of a row out front. Trouble, obviously. Anyway, by now someone should be planting charges in the cellars. So let’s not waste time. We can ask questions later.”
On a narrow landing where the stairs turned through a right angle, a large, built-in cupboard faced them squarely, its door a little ajar. Jordan kept his crossbow lined up on the large-panelled door, sidled past and continued up the stairs. He wasn’t passing the buck; it was simply that if there was anything nasty in there, he knew Layard could stop it with a single burst of liquid fire.
Layard checked that the valve on his hose was open, rested his finger on the trigger, toed the door open. In there … darkness.
He waited until his eyes were growing accustomed to the dimness, then spotted a light switch on the wall just inside the door. He reached out his hand, then drew it back. He stepped forward a pace, used the nozzle of his hose to trip the switch. A light came on, throwing the interior of the cupboard into sharp relief. At the back—a a tall figure! Layard drew
breath sharply; his jaw fell partly open and the corners of his mouth drew back in a half-rictus of fear. He was a breath from squeezing the trigger—but then his eyes focussed and he saw only an old raincoat, hanging on a peg.
Layard gulped, filled his lungs, quietly closed the door.
Jordan was up on the first floor landing. He saw two alcoves, arched over, with closed doors set centrally. There was also a passage, with two more doors that he could see before the corridor turned a corner. The closest door was maybe eight paces away, the furthest twelve. He turned back to the doors in the alcoves, approached the first of them, turned the doorknob and kicked it open, it was a toilet with a high window, letting in grey light.
Jordan turned to the second door, dealt with it as with the first. Inside was an extensive library, the whole room visible at a glance. Then, aware that Layard was coming up the stairs, he started down the corridor—and at once paused. His ears pricked up. He heard … water? The hiss and gurgle of a tap?
A shower! The water sounds were coming from the second room—a bathroom?—down the corridor. Jordan looked back. Layard was at the top of the stairs. Their eyes met. Jordan pointed to the first door, then at Layard. Layard was to deal with it. Then Jordan thumbed his own chest, pointed along the corridor to the second door.
He went on, but cautiously, crossbow held chest high and pointed dead ahead. The water sounds were louder, and—a voice? A girl’s voice—singing? Humming, anyway. Some utterly tuneless melody …
In this house at this time, a girl humming to herself in a shower? Or was it a trap?
Jordan took a tighter grip on his crossbow, turned the knob and kicked in the door. No trap! Not that he could see. In fact the completely (natural scene beyond the bathroom door left him at a total loss. All of the tension went out of him in a moment, and he was left feeling … like some gross intruder!
The girl (Helen Lake, surely?) was beautiful, and quite naked. Water streamed down on her, setting her lovely body gleaming. She stood sideways on, picked out in clear definition against blue ceramic tiles, in the shower’s shallow well. As the door slammed open she jerked her head round to stare at Jordan, her eyes opening wide in terror. Then she gasped, crumpled back against the shower’s wall, looking as if she were about to faint. One hand flew to her breasts and her eyelids fluttered as her knees began to give way.
Jordan half-lowered his crossbow, said to himself: Sweet Jesus! But this is just a frightened girl! He began to reach out his free hand—to steady her—but then other thoughts, her thoughts, abruptly printed themselves on his telepathic mind.
Come on my sweet! come help me! Ah, just touch me, hold me! Just a little closer, my sweet … there! And now—
Jordan jerked back as she turned more fully towards him. Her eyes were wide, triangular, demonic! Her face had been instantly transformed into that of a beast! And in her right band, invisible until now, was a carving knife. The knife rose as she reached out and grasped Jordan’s jacket. Her grip was iron! She drew him effortlessly towards her—and he fired his bolt into her breast point-blank.
Slammed back against the rear wall of the shower, pinned there by the bolt, she dropped her knife and began to issue peal after ringing peal of soul-searing screams. Blood gushed from where the bolt was bedded in her with little more than its flight protruding. She grasped it, and still screaming jerked her body this way and that. The bolt came loose from the wall in a crunching of tiles and plaster and she staggered to and fro in the shower, yanking on the bolt and screaming endlessly.
“God, God, oh God!” Jordan cried, riveted to the spot.
Layard shouldered him aside, squeezed the trigger on his flame-thrower, turned the entire shower unit into a blistering, steaming pressure-cooker. After several seconds he stopped hosing, and stared with Jordan at the result. Black smoke and steam cleared and the water continued to hiss, spurting from half-a-dozen places now in the molten plastic tubing of the shower’s system. In the shallow well, Helen Lake’s body slumped, features bubbling, hair like smouldering stubble, every inch of her skin peeling from her in great raw strips.
“God help us!” Jordan gasped, turned away to be sick.
“God?” the thing in the shower croaked, like a voice from the abyss. “What god? You bloody black bastards!”
Impossibly she came erect, took a blind, stumbling, groping step forward.
Layard torched her again, but more out of mercy than from fear. He let his flame-thrower roar until fire belched out of the shower and threatened to burn him, too. Then he switched off, backed away down the corridor to where Jordan stood retching over the stair’s balustrade.
From below, Roberts’s voice reached anxiously up to them: “Ken? Trevor? What is it?”
Layard wiped his forehead. “We … we got the girl,” he whispered, then shouted. “We got the girl!”
“We got her mother,” Roberts answered, “and Bodescu’s dog. That leaves Bodescu himself, and his mother.”
“There’s a door up here, locked,” Layard called back. “I thought I heard someone in there.”
“Can’t you break it in?”
“No, it’s oak, old and heavy. I could burn it …”
“No time for that. And if there is anyone in there, they’re finished anyway. The cellars are mined by now. You’d better come down—and quickly! We have to get out of here.”
Layard dragged Jordan after him down the stairs, calling ahead. “Guy, where the hell have you been?”
“I’m on my own,” Roberts responded. “Trask’s out of it for now—but he’s OK. Where’ve I been? I’ve been checking this place through downstairs.”
“A waste of time,” Jordan groaned, half to himself.
“What?” Roberts raised his voice more yet.
“I said, we’d already done it!” Jordan yelled, but needlessly for they were down the stairs, with Roberts propelling them towards the entrance hall and the open door …
Simon Gower and Harvey Newton had gone down into the cellars via the outbuilding with its narrow steps and central ramp. Loaded down with almost two hundred pounds of explosives between them, they had found the lights out of order, and so been obliged to use pocket torches. The vaults under the house were black and silent as a tomb, seemed extensive as a catacomb. They stuck close together. dumping thermite and plastic explosive packages wherever they found support walls or buttressed archways, and even though they went with something of caution, still they managed rapidly to fairly well saturate the place with their load. Newton carried a small can of petrol with which he left a trail from one dump to the next, until the whole place reeked of highly volatile fuel.
Finally they were satisfied that they’d explored and mined every part—and likewise pleased that they’d come across nothing dangerous—and so turned back and retraced their tracks to the exit. At a place they both agreed to be approximately central under the house, they set down the last of their load. Then Newton splashed what was left of his petrol all the way to the foot of the outbuilding steps, while Gower double-checked the charges they’d planted, making sure they were all amply primed.
At the steps Newton tossed down his empty can, turned and looked back into the gloom. From a little way back, round a corner, he could hear Gower’s hoarse breathing and he knew that the other man worked furiously at his task. Gower’s torch made flickering patches of light back there, its beam swinging this way and that as he worked.
Roberts appeared at the top of the steps, called down, “Newton, Gower? You can come up out of there as quick as you like. We’re all set if you are. The others are spread out round the house, just waiting. The mist has cleared. So if anything tries to break loose, we’ll—”
“Harvey?” Gower’s tremulous voice came out of the darkness, several notes higher up the scale than it should be. “Harvey, was that you just then?”
Newton called back, “No, it’s Roberts. Hurry up, will you?”
“No, not Roberts,” Gower was breathless, almost whispering. �
�Something else …”
Roberts and Newton looked at each other round-eyed. The ground gave itself a shake, a very definite tremor. From inside the cellars, Gower screamed.
Roberts came half-way down the steps, stumbling and yelling: “Simon, get out of there! Hurry, man!”
Gower screamed again, the cry of a trapped animal. “It’s here, Guy! Oh. God—it’s here! Under the ground!”
Newton made to go in after him but Roberts reached down and grabbed his collar. The ground was shaking now, dust billowing out of the yawning mouth of the old cellars. There were rending sounds, and other noises which might or might not be Gower choking his life out. Bricks started to slide loose from rotten mortar in the retaining walls, spilling down the sides of the ramp.
Newton started to back up the trembling steps, with Roberts dragging him from above. When they were almost at the top, they saw a cloud of dust and debris suddenly expelled forcefully from the entrance to the cellar—and then the door itself was lifted off its rusty hinges and hurled down at the foot of the ramp, a mass of splintered boards.
Something was framed in the dusty gap of the entrance. It was Gower, and it was more than Gower. He hung for a moment suspended in the otherwise empty doorway, swaying left and right. Then he emerged more fully and the watchers saw the huge, leprous trunk which propelled him. The thing—indeed “the Other”—had entered his back in a solid shaft of matter, but inside Gower its massive pseudopod of vampire flesh had branched, following his pipes and conduits to several exits. Tentacles writhed from his gaping mouth and nostrils, the sockets of his dislocated eyes, his ruptured ears. And even as Roberts and Newton clambered in a frenzy of terror up the last few steps from the ramp, so Gower’s entire front burst open, revealing a lashing nest of crimson, groping worms!
“Jesus!” Guy Roberts shouted then, his voice a sandpapered howl of horror and hatred. “Sweet J-e-s-u-s!”
He aimed his hose down the ramp. “Goodbye, Simon. God grant you peace!”