“Oh, aye. Most people think this place is haunted.”
“Do you think it’s haunted?”
“Nae, I’m not the sort who believes in ghosties. But might tell me mates down at the pub that I saw a monster or two. For a bit of a laugh, ye know?”
“Delightful.” Oliver smiled weakly.
They sat in silence across from each other for several minutes, drinking their coffees, the other man becoming gradually more uncomfortable with the silence. He fiddled with his coffee cup, and his nostril twitched with some sort of a nervous tic. He glanced around the kitchen as if he was looking for something to talk about, and several times he opened his mouth, but nothing came out. Instead, he pushed his empty coffee cup away and looked at his hands.
Oliver sipped slowly, amused by the man’s discomfort. Then, when his coffee was finished, he turned to the man and said: “If you’ll follow me.”
The chair made a loud scraping noise across the tiles when McDougal got to his feet, and Oliver winced, his head still throbbing. He waved impatiently at the man to come along and led him to the junction box just off the main hall.
“There you go. I hope you don’t mind if I leave you to it?”
“That’s nae problem at all, lad.” McDougal gave Oliver a thumbs-up, put his black case down on the floor and opened it with two determined clicks. Oliver stalked off, desperate to find an aspirin for his headache.
***
Hungry. It wasn’t a word she heard exactly, nor was it the feeling she had in her stomach when she was alive… the house whispered it to her somehow. Bam knew she was hungry for life; she craved pain and blood. Every fibre of her wanted to kill, wanted to torment. The presence of the new living soul in the house was too overwhelming for her to ignore. The house wanted her to have this, wanted her to taste the feeling of blood on her lips, to feel the sensation of heat again, to consume life. Bam closed her eyes and concentrated on the man… he was near the entrance.
***
As Harry suspected, the router was terribly out of date. He grabbed his newer model and applied it with professional skill, rubbing his hands together in admiration when he was done. “Do you think the phones will work now?” A female voice with an American accent asked.
He turned to see a young woman standing behind him. She was short, and a little weird looking according to Harry’s taste. She had blonde hair with pink streaks in it, and Harry decided that if she were his daughter, he would make her wash that crap out. He did notice she had a very nice chest, and he felt like a dirty old man for admiring a girl so young.
“Phone should work fine. Let me test it first though.” He took out his receiver and plugged it into the junction box. To his great satisfaction, he heard a dial tone. “See, there ye go. Connected to the rest of the world now. I’m not sure if ye can get Internet up here though. Ye’ll have to talk to the company about that. I just do phones.”
“Is that all?”
“Aye, it’s that simple. Now it’s up to the main office to give ye a phone number and get ye connected, but that should take only a few minutes, and they do that from a distance. I’m done here.”
“Would you mind looking at the other junction box too?”
“What do ye mean?” Harry scratched under his red cap, his nails scraping across his balding scalp. “There’s only one junction box.”
“No, I’m sure there’s another one in the South Wing.” The girl put her hands in her pockets and brought her shoulders almost up to her ears.
“Are ye sure?”
“Yes, I live here. I think I would know these things. Didn’t Oliver tell you?”
“Nae. But… it’s highly unlikely that—”
“Can you at least just look at it?”
“Aye, lead the way.” Harry shook his head, convinced that the girl was wrong, but he had a few minutes to kill and his curiosity was piqued.
The South Wing, as the girl had called it, was in worse shape than the main hall, and Harry hoped it would be safe to walk here without a hard hat. There were large lumps of concrete on the cracked marble floors, which must have come from somewhere. He eyed the walls, but they looked solid enough, and the ceiling, although very high up, didn’t look too damaged. It was a nice house, though, and with a bit of love and care it would fix up great. But as it was, it suited the ghost stories that were told about it. All it lacked were large paintings with stern, old-fashioned characters looking down on him.
“Down here.” The girl opened a large metal door, and she waved for him to go down first. “You’ll find the light switch at the bottom of the stairs. It’s a rope. You can’t miss it.”
“All right.” He shrugged and walked down the stone stairs. Harry didn’t mind the dark, given how often he had dealt with it in his career, but there was something about this basement that gave him the creeps. For one, the temperature was too low.
“I’m so sorry.” Her voice sounded far away. “I belong to Angel Manor now, and I must obey. I never meant to hurt you.” Before McDougal reached the end of the stairs, the girl closed the door with a heavy bang.
Harry swore.
***
Bam leaned against the door. Phantom tears ran down her cheeks; she was torn between who she was as a living person and who the house wanted her to be. It would be so easy to just give in, to merge with the others and feed. Bam knew she would be more fulfilled, but if she did, she would lose all sense of freedom and all sense of self.
She had no qualms about killing, not now… not when she knew what death truly was. The fear that the living had for the afterlife was unnecessary and a little ridiculous. Death was in many ways like life… it simply was, and no amount of thought would change it. And like life, death forced you to choose a path. Bam was ready to choose, and she knew her aim would be freedom. If the house wanted living souls, it could have them. But she would not feast along.
***
“Open the door, lass. It’s very dark in here,” Harry called to the closed door. There was no reply, and he considered heading back up the stairs, but the work had to be done and it was only a few more steps to the light switch. He stepped onto the solid ground and grabbed into the air to find the rope. After several failed attempts, his fingers finally clutched around something and he pulled. The weak yellow light turned on, and Harry found himself staring at a group of naked women.
“Is this some kind of joke?” He almost laughed, the situation was so absurd. “My wife won’t appreciate this, ladies.” Harry stared at an attractive blonde woman with small perky breasts. In her hand, she held what looked like a rusty sickle. Nerves surged through his body, there was something about the colour of the women’s skin and the way their eyes looked that he found truly unnerving. He averted his eyes, hoping to make the situation less awkward.
“Look at me, Harry,” a sultry voice said, and Harry stared into the pale eyes of the blonde.
“How did you know my name?”
She brought the tip of the sickle to the corner of her mouth and licked her lips. With slow determination she pushed the metal through her cheek. Harry groaned.
“We know you, Harry.” Black blood ran past her chin, and she stepped forward. “You are one of us now.”
She sliced the blade across his chest, cutting through his shirt and the skin underneath as if she were slicing through butter. Harry cried out in pain.
“What are ye doing, ye crazy bitch?” He took a step back, but another of the women moved behind him. The sickle came down across his skin again, and his shirt bloomed with crimson as two other women swept at him with knives, their sharp blades cutting into his back. He held up his arms protectively, but hands clutched onto him, forcing his arms down. The blonde stood before him again, her eyes filled with hunger. She brought the sickle back and pushed it into Harry’s soft throat with force. Skin and cartilage ripped under the pressure, and for a moment it didn’t even hurt. Then the pain hit him, searing and screaming, while hot blood poured from his wound. His face
was a mask of surprise, and he saw the light slowly dim. This wasn’t the day I was supposed to die, were his last thoughts as hundreds of voices called out to him, telling him to join them. Harry’s body slumped to the ground, his spirit melting into the deep magic of Angel Manor.
Chapter 24
The van from the phone company was parked near the house, and Freya smiled as she drove past it. The thought of being able to phone from Angel Manor and not having to cross the invisible border to the land of headaches and nausea made her want to sing with glee. She parked her car and made her way to the front door, where she was greeted by some of the young men having a smoke break.
“Hey, guys. How’s it going?”
“Fine, we finished the stairs today. The main entrance is starting to look pretty snazzy.” Angus flicked his cigarette aside and stood up. He glanced over her breasts, and his expression reminded her of a cat stalking a mouse. She pulled her shirt over her cleavage and raised an eyebrow at him.
“Good to hear you’re making so much progress. Have you seen Oliver?”
“No, he hasn’t been about much lately.”
“I’ll find him.” She pushed her way past and stepped into the house. Angus had been speaking the truth; the entrance hall really was cleaning up nicely. All it needed was a lick of paint, and if the psychic could indeed perform a successful exorcism, Freya might still consider a reception area. If Angel Manor could become ghost free, maybe it would be a good idea to proceed with their plans for a hotel. She hadn’t decided yet – it would be so different without Bam around – and at the same time, Freya hated the idea that it would have all been for nothing. “Oliver?” She peered around the corner of the kitchen, but there was no sign of her friend. “Ollie?” She made her way to his bedroom and found him lying on the bed. He looked pale, and his eyes were glazed over.
“Are you okay?”
“I will be, as soon as the equinox is here.” His voice was soft and dreamy, then he sat up abruptly. Freya yelped. “Frey? When did you get here?”
“Just now, I asked you if you were okay.” Her hand clutched her chest in an attempt to calm her pounding heart. “Jesus, you scared me.”
“What are you doing in here?”
“Looking for you, knob-end. Why are you still in bed? It’s past one.”
“I wasn’t feeling well.”
“You don’t look well.” Freya sat at the end of his bed and placed her hand against his forehead. “You’re burning up.”
“Yeah, just leave me be for a bit and I’ll be fine.” He turned to his side, his back towards her, and pulled a pillow over his eyes. After a moment, he pulled the pillow from his face and glared back at her. “Speaking of not feeling well… I thought you were going to phone a doctor to have everyone checked out?”
“No, something came up that made me wonder if getting a doctor was necessary.”
“It couldn’t hurt.” Oliver narrowed his eyes at her, and Freya cringed.
“I guess… whatever, let’s focus on one thing at a time here, okay? I came in to ask you something.”
“What?” Oliver looked over his shoulder.
“The phone guy, did you let him in?”
“Yes, a while back. He came just after you left.”
“Where is he now? I didn’t see him when I came in.”
“He probably left, Frey. Why are we talking about this?”
“He didn’t leave. His car is still here.”
“Is it? Maybe he’s eating lunch or something.”
“Because that makes sense.” Freya threw her hands up in the air and shot Oliver an incredulous look. “Why would he be eating lunch here? Jesus, Ollie, tell me you didn’t leave him to fend for himself?”
“What was I supposed to do?” Oliver lifted himself on his elbow, the bed creaking under his movement, and he looked at her through a mass of tousled curls. “Hold his freaking tools? Why are you whining at me?”
“You’re useless, that’s why.”
“I’m fucking ill, Freya. Stop nagging.”
“You could have asked Logan to see him in. Damn it, Ollie, we can’t let strangers just roam around in here.”
“No, we’ve been over this. The house isn’t dangerous. It’s just a house for fuck’s sake.” He fell back onto the bed and waved at her to go. “Piss off, you’re making my headache worse.”
She slid off the bed, her feet landing solidly on the ground, and she stared at her friend. Oliver was different somehow. She couldn’t quite put her finger on it. Perhaps he was more irritable… or just a different kind of irritable. The close bond they’d once shared felt frayed lately, but life had been a little insane, so Freya didn’t want to make too much of it. She left the dark bedroom in search of the missing man from the phone company.
***
“Still no sign of the phone guy?” Logan sat next to her at the kitchen table, his face covered in a thin layer of dust.
“No, but his van is still here.”
“Where do you think he could be?”
“I don’t know, but I’m worried, Logan. What if something’s happened to him? People are going to come looking. I really don’t want to deal with that. What if they arrest us? We can’t leave the premises without getting sick.”
“Calm down. Nothing has happened yet. Let’s not panic until we know more.”
“He’s been here for eight hours, Logan… at least. And not one sign of him. It’s hard not to panic. What if he ran into something? Like those angels the children talked about? Or something else?”
“I’ll have my boys do a full sweep of the house, okay? Could be that the guy just injured himself and he’s lying at the bottom of some stairs with a broken leg.”
“Is it bad that I’m hoping that will be the case?”
“What else could it be? We met the ghosts, and we’re still fine.”
“True, but…”
Logan bent forward and took her hands in his. “Listen, let’s not drive ourselves crazy okay? Let’s not panic before we know more. Deal? If we haven’t found him by the morning, we’ll come up with something.” He sat back and let go of her hands. “Worst case scenario, we push his car off Lucifer Falls, into that big hole in the middle. No one will find it there.” He laughed at his own joke, but Freya didn’t have the heart to laugh with him. She worried, if it was the house, the boys would have to leave here as soon as possible.
“Did you manage to reach that psychic?” Logan’s words cut through her thoughts.
“What?”
“You were going to call the psychic today, weren’t you?”
“Oh yes, she’s coming up here tomorrow morning.”
“That soon?”
“She seemed quite keen.”
“Well that’s good. That will give us some more clarity.”
“If she isn’t a charlatan.”
“If she isn’t a charlatan.” Logan nodded.
***
Oliver woke as the sun was setting. He had spent most of the day in bed, feverish, but now he felt oddly refreshed. The equinox was drawing near. He wondered why the house chose him over Freya, but in the back of his mind, he knew it wasn’t that the house had chosen him, it was that he had chosen the house. Freya never loved the place, not the way he did. Oliver loved the house before he’d ever set foot in it, and the promise of what this place could become was what bonded him to it. He needed the house more than Freya did, and that’s why it wanted him.
His dream of being a chef had faded; he cared little about rebuilding the kitchen or feeding guests his carefully crafted food. Instead, he dreamed about his bond with Angel Manor and how he would bring it everything it needed. He was its Guardian, and the task suited him well. He would bring the place souls to feed on, like a bird would bring its offspring worms. With each passing day, he gave more and more of himself to the house, bonding with the ancient magic within. He understood how the spirits felt; he was one of them, the only difference being that his spirit was still housed in a shell m
ade of flesh and bone.
Somewhere beneath the brick and the concrete, something else pulsated like a slow throbbing heart, its magic running through Angel Manor like tiny black veins. Being a part of something this big and this important, Oliver could scarcely remember what it was like to be someone ordinary. He would never be unloved or unwanted again, the house would see to that.
“Thank you for the gift.” He hadn’t seen her enter the room, but he felt her presence almost immediately. She looked as human as he did now, the dawning of the equinox having affected her greatly.
“What gift?” Oliver raised his eyebrows, then realisation dawned on him. “Oh… the phone guy. I’m glad he pleased you.”
“The house is very pleased.”
Pride filled his chest, but a moment later the smile faded from his lips.
“I’d better get rid of the van before Freya gets too suspicious.”
“Yes, but first, it’s time to show you something.”
“What?”
“Why we are here. Why this house is what it is.”
“I can sense it. It’s underneath the house, right?”
“Yes, I will show you where the master sleeps, and the importance of the solstice and the equinox.”
“Show me.” He looked at her through half-lidded eyes. She beckoned him with a long, pale finger, inviting him to follow her, and he obeyed.
Chapter 25
Marie-Claire Florifera stared at the car window. Although her blind eyes could not see the world passing outside, she liked feeling the sunlight on her face. Something far below sang to her, something as old as the world itself. Though she sensed the magic, it was obscured from her second-sight. Her corporeal eyes saw nothing of the mortal world, yet they were very sensitive to the world beyond the veil, and she could see spirits as well as those with 20/20 sight could see people. Why she had this talent, she didn’t know. All she knew was that she had always been able to see the dead, and she didn’t fear them anymore.
She had seen many haunted places in this world; some were truly haunted while others only bore the ghosts of overactive imaginations. Marie-Claire had encountered some truly spectacular occurrences, and she had felt a little guilty when she lied to the girl on the phone about the dangers of spirits. She knew how dangerous they could really be, but it was in no one’s best interest if the living feared the dead. That would only give the spirits more power.
Angel Manor (Lucifer Falls Book 1) Page 23