Absence_Whispers and Shadow

by J. B. Forsyth

  She swung her legs up on the bed and laid back, thinking about the journey ahead. The hideout was many miles away and it would take over a week to get there. But the weather was warm and the countryside thick with summer. They would camp out and forage the land, and if she could persuade him to take a slight detour, she might even get chance to swim in the Glimmer. She imagined their little campfire at the edge of the water and smiled.

  Hide and Seek

  Della was deep into her daydream when the room flashed with lightning. It was followed a few seconds later by a rumble of thunder that shook the house. She sprang to her feet and crossed to the window. The wind was mauling the trees and bending them to its every whim. It was so strong now, it was blowing the rain almost horizontally at her window and it was running down the panes in little rivulets and rushing along the gutters. She waited for the wind to angle away and opened the window, putting her hand out into the rain. It ran down her arm and dripped off her elbow, but her room was stuffy and the coolness of it was most welcome.

  When the next flash of lightning lit the whole countryside up she realised how foolish it was to be sitting there. If the monster was close by, it could easily have spotted her leaning out. She pulled the window shut as a second louder peal of thunder rumbled over and returned to bed. As she listened to the incessant thrumming of rain it occurred to her that in such a downpour the trackers might have to call off their search for the monster.

  All at once she decided to go out and find it herself. It was the strangest and most disturbing thought she had ever had. Not because it was so blatantly foolish, but because it felt as if the decision had been placed in her mind. She tried to push the idea away, but it kept coming back again; reappearing like a coin in a magician’s palm. She knew thoughts could do that sometimes - especially those you tried to put out of your mind. Clearing the mind was the hardest part of the transition into Absence as trying not to think about something was the surest way to keep thinking about it. But this felt different. This thought – this decision to go out and look for the monster felt forced.

  She jerked up when she got a sense of a shadowy hand, etching the thought into her mind. Was the strange blackness that made her strike out at Ismara now beginning to influence her thoughts? She tried to fight the decision, but it seemed to write itself in bigger letters every time she rubbed it out.

  Go out and find it.

  She tried to reason it away, but the arguments she raised were themselves reasoned away. She told herself it was unnecessary to go out and find the monster.

  But don’t you need to know where it is, so you don’t run into it?

  She told herself that it was too much of a risk.

  But what risk would it really be? If I stay up high, it can’t grab me again.

  And she told herself she had to wait for her uncle.

  But isn’t he making sure the hideaway is safe? Shouldn’t I do my bit, instead of waiting around idle?

  For a time, she teetered on a knife edge of indecision then fell the wrong side of it. She was now resolved to go out and find the monster and the idea that a shadowy hand had etched the idea into her mind was instantly forgotten.

  She went to her uncle’s bedroom. He was laid on top of the blankets - his only movement the gentle rise and fall of his chest. She watched him with excitement as well as a drop of jealousy. He would be at the hideaway by now, doing a thorough check of the house and the secret trail that led to it. She imagined him floating like some ghostly caretaker, making note of jobs that needed doing. He would be a while yet; more than enough time to take a quick look around the village. She kissed him on the forehead and returned to her room, smiling at the thought of him pulling up all those miles away and puzzling over the sensation.

  She climbed onto her bed and settled her head on the pillow next to Rayle’s poppy. She closed her eyes, tuning into the thrum of the rain as she cleared her mind and relaxed her body. The transition into Absence was easier in a bed – she didn’t have to worry as much about getting sores or whether someone would find her. She focused on the splotches of colour behind her eyelids. Yesterday there were hues of red, orange and yellow amongst them, but in the gloom of her bedroom there was only green, purple and blue. In a variation of her detachment ritual she brought the colour floaters together at the centre of her mind’s eye and swirled them out of existence. For a split second there was only blackness and then she was looking at her beamed ceiling and rising toward it.

  She accelerated through the roof and out into the black sky just as another rumble of thunder rolled across it. She brought herself vertical and for a time just hung in the rain, looking across to the village and wondering where to start her search. She decided it would be best to start somewhere the monster had been and sped away with lightning flashing all around her.

  She came quickly to the large farmhouse where Rayle Oakley lived with his family a short time ago. She had been there once before; accompanying her uncle while he repaired some shingles in return for a month’s worth of eggs. She remembered the farmhouse as a handsome building with red ivy around the main door and flower boxes in every window. But it looked different now. Its lifeless sprawl was black and sorrowful and the rain pouring off its gutters and streaking down its windows reminded her of tears. It was a house mourning the people who had loved it.

  She circled the building; peering into the dark rooms behind each window and checking the doors. Then she searched the other farm buildings in the same manner. There were some chickens weathering the storm in the barn and a pair of whickering horses pacing in the stable. But there was no sign of the monster. As she was looking for clues she was struck by the futility of searching in such heavy rain and began to wonder why she was doing it.

  She decided to call off her search and head back home. But as she came to the river she saw what appeared to be two people sheltering beneath a willow tree. She angled towards them to take a closer look and drew up suddenly when she realised there was something wrong with what she was seeing. She couldn’t make out their faces, but their postures were at odds with the weather. Instead of huddling together against the storm they were positioned in the wet grass as if they were on a picnic. She drifted closer to get a better look and just when she reached the perfect vantage point, lightning flashed across the sky, lighting them up. Lady Demia was slumped at the foot of the tree with her waxy face angled upwards. Rainwater half-filled the socket where her right eye should have been and the overflow was trickling down her cheek. Mr Tilder was flopped over her lap as if she was lulling him to sleep, but his neck was bent back at an unnatural angle and his throat was torn out.

  Della reeled back in horror and shot up into the sky. She escaped the gruesome scene, but couldn’t escape the image and it followed her all the way up through the thunder cloud; emblazoned in the forefront of her mind. She turned to look back down only when she emerged into the calm twilight above the storm. Lady Demia and Mr Tilder were dead and the black clouds were passing over them like an enormous shroud. They had crossed paths with the monster no more than a hundred yards from the school steps. She thought about them hurrying away from school, not knowing they were seconds away from a brutal death and it chilled her more thoroughly than if she had risen bodily through the storm.

  She passed through the cloud again, meaning to get her bearing on the underside and head for home. But as the lights of South Agelrish came back into view another idea was thrust onto her:

  Shouldn’t I take a quick look in the village on the way back?

  She decided it was a good idea. Finding Lady Demia and Mr Tilder didn’t change anything except highlight how dangerous the monster was. And if she found it, she could lead it away. She could take it in the opposite direction to the hideaway and then double back; giving them more time to get safely away. So with great dread and equal resolve she headed for the village.

  The streets were dark, except for where the yellow glow of oil lamps leaked through unshuttered windows,
highlighting the rain as it bounced on the cobbles. She scoured the village from one end to the other, peeking beneath overhanging shop fronts and into dark nooks and passages. But the streets were deserted and she found no clues to where the monster was hiding. She came to the village square and hovered over the large elm. In the blackness of the storm she was a spectre of moonlight through which the rain passed in a diagonal sheet. As she considered her next move, she thought she heard the whispers again. But when she tried to focus on them, they faded into the wind. The monster was close and if it wasn’t hiding in the streets it had to be in one of the houses.

  I have to search them.

  The idea appalled her. To go into the buildings uninvited was to trespass people’s property and private life – something that was wrong in whatever form she was in. Her uncle had once told her, that you can tell what type of person you are by the way you behave when no one can see you. Absence allowed her to leave her body, but she had vowed never to leave her principles behind. But it was more than just the morality of trespassing. If she went through the houses without knowing the occupants’ locations; she would run a high risk of passing through one of them as she emerged from the walls. It would be an unpleasant experience for some, but for anyone with a weak heart, it could be fatal.

  But even as she was reasoning herself out of it, she was already drifting over to the houses – drawn by a subtle magnetism of which she was unaware. I have to search them. It’s the only way.

  Leaving the storm behind she disappeared into the first house, emerging into the private life of her fellow villagers. She searched every house from top to bottom, minimising the danger to the inhabitants by staying within the walls. Scene after scene flashed by - a varied gallery of home life framed with walls and littered with chatter, song and laughter. The faces were familiar, but their expressions were not. Within their homes the villagers were unguarded and honest. In one room Jimmy Omestone stood at a basin in only his britches, splashing water into his face. In another, the Cooper family sat around the dinner table, their old man cracking a joke and the rest of them bursting with laughter. Mrs Higgs next door was toiling over the kitchen sink while her husband sat in a rocking chair, oiling his boots. Through another wall she found Mr Lonan whittling a piece of birch into a spoon, while in the room above, his daughter frowned over school books.

  In most of the households she was neither seen nor felt, but for a few with Membrane sensitivity, she didn’t go unnoticed. To Lady Barfont she was a sudden cold draft that made her shiver. To Mr Argeu, who was stretching beneath a dresser for a dropped coin, she was a presence in the dark corner in which he reached – a shock which caused him to recoil and bang his head on the dresser’s edge. Worst of all was Lady Farmin who gasped and dropped her new vase to grab at her heart; sure she had seen a face staring out of her fireplace.

  At first Della entered each room on a crest of fear, expecting the monster to spring out of the scenery like some horror in a pop-up book. But as time passed so did her fear; soothed away by a whispered lullaby she couldn’t hear. It was only when she reached the last few houses in the row that she became unsettled again. She had a creeping thought: that her search was a pretence and deep down she already knew where the monster was hiding. It put her in mind of the hide and seek games she played with children whose location she already knew. And how she would call out as she closed in on their hiding place. Is she behind this curtain? No she isn’t…What about under this table? …Oh… Not here either… Where ever can she be?

  Something was wrong. She went on, feeling increasingly detached from her actions. Some force was guiding her through the rooms and she realised what it was just as she passed into the last house.

  Whispers!

  Vat of Offal

  The moment she became aware of the whispers they amplified. It was a trap – but she discovered it too late. She was through the last wall before she could react, leaving a bedroom in which Lady Felmere rocked her baby to sleep, to emerge in the monster’s hiding place. It wasn’t the pop-up book scene she had imagined – it was worse. The last house in the row belonged to Lady Arabell and her bedroom looked like a slaughterhouse. The village seamstress lay across her bed, leaking blood onto sheets that would never be white again. The blue dress she was wearing was raked to ribbons, exposing her eviscerated abdomen. She had finished her days as a torn rag; well beyond what any of her stitch work could have repaired. On the far wall a wet mural of her bloody handprints shone in the lamplight. The monster was standing at the foot of the bed. Its arms were spread in a vile gesture of welcome and its wooden fingers were writhing with anticipation.

  It gathered her up and drew her inside. She tried to escape by thrusting through the centre of it again, but the whispers had learnt from last time and they collapsed around her with ear ringing force; holding her in place. As she sank deeper she reconnected with the monster’s physical sensation. Its legs and arms felt like animated tree roots and its flesh like shifting earth. Deeper still its mulchy interior gave way to a set of internal organs that shifted and squirmed as cavities within them opened and closed. It was like melting into a vat of warm offal and the vileness was so intimate her abandoned body retched several times; coming close to an expulsion that would have choked her to death.

  In a matter of seconds, she was wearing the monster and it was becoming baggier and baggier as she sank deeper inside. She fought it all the way, but the whispers were determined to keep her there and they contracted on her like a spherical net. As panic set in she heard another set of whispers originating from the back of her mind and blending with the others. As they began to synchronise the restraining force faltered and she drove for the window, breaking the link between them. She almost got away, but the monster grabbed her ankle and only her upper body passed through the glass. If anyone with Membrane sensitivity had been walking the street, they would have seen her spectral form projecting from the first floor window and twisting violently in the rain. A second set of woody claws fixed on her leg and the monster began to pull her back in, hand over hand. The whispers were furious now and they formed into words she understood: Give back what you took from me!

  She redoubled her efforts, yanking away and kicking at its grip. Great black blotches appeared in her vision and in the end she blacked out. For a few seconds there was nothing and then she was back in the room, watching the monster getting up from the floor. Her unexpected blackout had sent it staggering backwards like a tug of war contestant after a snapping of the rope. She shot out the window and it launched itself after her - exploding through the glass and falling into the night. It struck the cobbles with a meaty thud and lay there motionless.

  At first she thought it was dead. But then it twitched; scraped its stick hands along the cobbles and pushed itself up onto one knee. It rose with its back to her and as it turned a light flared in a nearby window, illuminating its features. It was the worst thing she had ever laid eyes on. It was hunched in the rain, wearing wet clothes identical to those she wore yesterday. Its arms were not only too long for its shirt sleeves, but for its body as well and they hung so low the tips of its wooden claws curled against its shins. But its face was the greatest horror: it was a crooked sculpture of hers, sagging slightly on the left side - an imperfection it sought to correct with a rolling twitch that ran up and down its face. Whispers streamed up to her, emanating, but not originating from it.

  Give back what you took from me!

  The same command again. But what did she take from this vile thing? As she looked down on the hideous parody of herself the other whispers spoke up from the back of her mind; gently coercing her to do as they asked. She realised they had been working on her for some time - hushed down so low she wasn’t able to hear them. They were responsible for her smudgy forgetfulness, her attacks on Ismara and her foolish decision to come out in the storm. What she tore from the whispers at Rinker’s Point was part of the person generating them. She wasn’t poisoned, she was possessed! />
  She lurched away; raking at herself with revulsion. But she soon realised the futility of her efforts. The whispers weren’t scabs she could scrape away – they were a consciousness dissolved in her. She forced herself calm and focused on them; using the skills acquired through Absence to compress them into the centre of her mind. If an exorcist had been watching, he would have said she was demonstrating extraordinary talent in the disciplines of subjugation and partitioning. The whispers fought back furiously. But she was awake to their presence now and she bundled them up with ease.

  A door opened behind the monster and a man stepped out and squinted into the rain. The abomination turned to him. Its shirt was soaked through and plastered against its body, revealing bumps and projections inconsistent with a human skeleton.

  ‘Go back in!’ she called out in warning. ‘It’s the monster that killed Rayle Oakley!’ But this man, like most people, couldn’t hear her in Absence. He was deaf in her reality and she was mute in his. He appraised the scene: the figure, the shards of glass around its feet and the broken window above it. And when he spoke she recognised him as Imich, the local farrier.

  ‘Della, is that you?’ he asked. Even with all its imperfections its likeness to her was undeniable. It stood with the sagging side of its face away from him, opening and closing its woody claws. ‘You’re soaked! What are you doing out in this rain girl?’ He took another step into the street, perhaps planning to offer dry clothes and a hot broth. The monster went to meet him in a disjointed manner and she realised some part of its strange anatomy had been dislocated by its fall. But after several steps it corrected its gait with a sideways thrust of its hip and a loud clunk.