The Haunted Sultan (Skeleton Key)

by Gillian Zane

  They lay still for only a few seconds, still joined. His cock never softened. He never withdrew. He moved her until she was on her side and he was at her back and pushing into her again and again. She raised her leg so he could have better access and he took her as she watched the sexual escapades of the people around her.

  There were more people. It had only been the Sultan and the dancers before, but now there were people on every available surface. They were all engaged in different sexual acts. Two, three and four people grouped together. Men with men, women with women, all lost in passion. They were all very different. Their styles. Their dress, even though most were undressed. Sierra noticed a woman with long light hair that curled in tight ringlets down her back. She was nude, but wore very distinct plastic bangles on her wrists and her hair was teased in a style out of the 80s, not the 1880s…the 1980s. There was also a young couple, vigorously engaged in oral sex on one large man that stood over their kneeling forms. The girl’s hair was done in pin curls, the man’s hair was short and slicked back with gel.

  They were people out of time. People who shouldn’t be here. A woman cried out and Sierra’s attention went to her. The woman was leaning back on a mound of pillows with another woman between her legs. The woman still wore her shirt, it was a local team’s jersey. The New Orleans football team. A very modern shirt that didn’t belong in this vintage environment.

  Sierra’s ears popped. She screamed. This time not in pleasure. This time in horror.

  The sumptuous room was replaced with a den of horrors. Blood was everywhere. Splatters of it were all over the walls and on every available surface. Sierra was even laying in it. She lifted her hand from the pillow and it came away slick with blood. And the corpses. There were dead bodies everywhere. The woman in the jersey, she lay dead, motionless, her jersey soaked with blood.

  Sierra shot away from Owen, slipping in the blood and accidentally slapping her hand against a woman that was lying on the floor. She too was dead. A moment ago she had watched as that woman was taken by the two men with the thick brown ponytails, now all three of them were missing their heads. They were in pieces. Their body parts strewn over the floor. The head of the woman was on the other side of a pile of pillows, frozen in shock, her mouth open as if to scream.

  The guard who had watched impassively at the door was on the floor too. His head also missing, his hand still gripping the curved blade of his scimitar.

  “Oh shit.” Sierra jerked away. Owen came up behind her, his hands on her. His bloody hands. She tried to pull away.

  “Sierra,” he murmured. His hands stroked her, they slipped between her legs, rubbing her. He held her strong. The pleasure was too intense. The way he made her feel. The blood faded. She sighed. But the blood, it was everywhere.

  Owen kissed her. There was no blood.

  Chapter 10

  Owen was drowning in the sensations. Falling under a spell that he couldn’t come back from. He was lost in this woman. Nothing like this before. Nothing like this again. They had fucked so many times he had lost count. He never went soft. His dick was as hard as a rock.

  The intensity of another orgasm whipped through him and he was seeing double. Double vision. Two worlds. One space. Horror. So much horror. But so much pleasure. He couldn’t bring together what he was seeing. His brain felt so heavy. So full.

  He shook his head and he forced himself to retreat from Sierra. She whined in protest. She was covered in blood.

  Blood. There was blood everywhere.

  Oh fuck, he hurt her. She was dead. What had he done to her? But she still moved. She beckoned him with her hands. She tried to pull him down, she wanted everything from him. He wanted to give her more of him.

  There was a bloody handprint on her leg. There was more on her stomach. It looked like it was from him. He looked down at his hands. They were covered in blood. She was writhing in it. He was buried inside of her, his dick in her pumping and they were both covered in blood.

  He stared down at her in horror. The world shifted and his ears popped. It hurt, like the time he had been on a plane when it had plummeted too fast during turbulence.

  His double vision rectified, fading into one. Fading into one house of horrors.

  The drapes that decorated the walls were shredded. They were shredded by the victims desperate to get away. One still clung to the fabric, wrapped in it, her body torn, ripped to shreds, her intestines were no longer inside of her, but hung loose from her body in thick, red ropes.

  Sierra touched him and her soft hands drew him back, drew him back to the pleasure. He looked down at her body and his own clenched in want. In need. In must have. He shook his head to clear it. This wasn’t right. What they were doing wasn’t right. This wasn’t him. He traced a finger over the pattern of her tattoos. He wanted to look closely at them, figure out what they meant.

  She felt so good. He wanted to come again and again in her. Make her his. Make her unable to ever leave.

  His own thoughts scared him. His ears popped again.

  “Sierra, no, Sierra.” He pushed her hands away and shook her by the shoulders.

  “This is wrong, this is so wrong.” He was on the verge of sobbing. He was so thrown off by his surroundings. This was so unbelievably wrong. He had taken this woman, a woman he had only recently met, in a pool of blood. Her back was coated in it. Her eyes were unfocused and she reached for him, focused on one thing, pleasure. He drew in a sharp breath, trying to resist the call of her touch. The urge to fall back into her, to lose himself. Something he wanted desperately to do. He didn’t want to stay in this reality. This horror. He wanted to fall back into the spell. He was still buried inside of her…all it took was one thrust and the spell would be back.

  Spell. That was it. It had to be some kind of thrall they were in. His muddled thoughts put two and two together. He would never have given himself so readily to the moment like this. The reality had to be the blood, the death, the rank odor of the dead. It had to be. There was no other explanation. Even though it was such a terrible reality.

  “Sierra.” He shook her. Her eyes remained unfocused. She pulled on his arm, moaning, begging for him.

  “Sierra,” he said again more insistently and he shook her harder. Her head snapped to the side, banging into the leg of a chair. Her hands flew up, the pain jolting her out of the lust filled world she had been stuck within.

  He knew he had her when her eyes widened in horror and she covered her breasts demurely, whimpering when she saw the blood on her hands. Owen got to his feet and rummaged around for his shirt, handing it to her. She slipped it over her head gratefully.

  He pulled on his pants and shoes and pulled her to her feet. His shirt fell to her thighs and for some reason he found that sexier than when she was nude and underneath him. He pulled her to him and began brushing off the stuffing from the pillow that had been their makeshift bed.

  “What happened to us?” she said, looking anywhere but at him.

  “I think we were trapped in some kind of lust spell, I don’t know. That’s the only thing I can think of. Spell. That’s my answer. What the ever living fuck?” He went to run a hand through his hair but thought better of it and wiped his palms on his jeans.

  “Before this trip I didn’t believe in ghosts or spells or anything, but what we did, that wasn’t natural. What happened to us, that’s not me, I would never.” He tried to explain it the best way he could without being insulting. Hard to do when they were trying to avoid stepping on body parts and he had just screwed her brains out for God knows how long.

  “Are these ghosts?” She looked down at the dead around her, tears were running down her cheeks. The horror was so immense it was surreal, almost unbelievable. Owen processed it all like he would a movie. Nothing this horrible could be real.

  Owen pulled back the curtains and looked out into night. The sun had set and there were gas lanterns burning across the street. They were still in the past.

  “I think this is
just another reality, the reality after everyone was killed.”

  “This is horrible.” She went to step over a small female strewn across the floor and she missed, slipping in the woman’s blood. Owen grabbed for her to steady her. She was staring at her toes, her open sandals were now coated in blood. “I can’t…” She rushed to the side and began to vomit. It took everything in Owen’s reserves not to join her. His senses were overwhelmed, but he was still thinking rationally, he was still holding it together. He had to. If not for him, for Sierra. If he broke down there would be no going back. He was displaced and confused. This was some sort of alternate reality. He had to stay focused to get them out of here. Everything would be okay.

  This wasn’t real.

  It was real. A long time ago. But not now. Not real now.

  Sierra was done being sick. She straightened up and wiped at her mouth, her eyes were dim. She was in shock. No one could process these atrocities. Owen dug a pack a gum out of his jeans pocket and handed Sierra a piece. She took it and nodded gratefully. Was he sick to still be attracted to her? Was it the spell, he asked himself?

  “How do we get out of here?”

  “I think we have to do what we intended, help them and then we’ll be able to leave,” he replied. It was the only logical ending to this mess.

  “Then I guess we have to figure out how to help,” she said, her back straight, her eyes determined.

  Chapter 11

  Sierra felt her brain slowly come back into focus. Before she had felt drugged, sluggish, out of it. She didn’t want to think about what she had done with Owen. The things they had done together. How intense it had been.

  He had to be right about the lust thing. They were spelled or something. She would never have acted that way. Granted, it had felt good, she had never experienced anything even close to what they had done together, but it had been influenced by something. Something that scared the crap out of her.

  She looked at her feet. They were coated in the blood of the pretty serving girl. Something glinted from underneath a pillow and she kicked it aside to reveal a scimitar. She picked it up and gripped it in her hand, it felt good there. She didn’t know if ghosts could be taken out with a blade, but it was better than nothing.

  Owen nodded in agreement, it was a good idea to find protection. He looked around the room and saw the other fallen guard. He tried to tug the blade from the guard’s hand, which seemed harder to do than expected. It was stuck and all he managed to do was shake the big man’s body, what was left of it at least. He shook the man’s hand harder, but still the guard’s dead fingers stayed stuck around the blade.

  Sierra knew this was going to screw with her head for eternity. She could see the PTSD lurking around the peripheral of her mind. She went to Owen’s side and kneeled down, even though everything in her screamed not to. She pried the guard’s hand open, finger by finger. They were stiff as a board and she heard cracking as she forced them open. The blade clattered to the ground and she scooped it up and handed it to Owen.

  “Thank you,” he said.

  “Welcome,” she replied out of habit.

  “You’re the strongest person I’ve ever met,” he whispered. She looked up and met his eyes surprised. No one had ever said that about her before. There was blood smeared across his chest and up both his arms. He looked like a deranged psychopath, but she couldn’t help but notice how fit he was, how muscular his chest and arms were. She remembered his chest flexing over her as he pounded into her again and again. She felt the tug of lust pull her away, into that other reality and she shook her head to stay focused. She had a feeling if they fell back into each other’s arms there would be no coming back.

  They would be like that couple who appeared to be from the 1920s. Stuck in this house for eternity. They couldn’t let that happen. They had to fix this house. How they were going to do that, though, was a mystery.

  “Help me.” The voice came from the back of the house. It was close, but low and distressed. It was the voice of the Sultan, the man they had met earlier.

  Sierra and Owen stepped over the body propped in the doorway. The look on the dead’s faces would haunt their nightmares forever, but they were determined to end this. They walked farther and farther into the house, down a long hallway, uncovering horror after horror. They found a room full of women. All of them were dressed in beautiful fabrics and beaded tops with long flowing skirts. All were dead. Their bodies had been run through with swords, their legs were red with blood from atrocities done to them. Two were completely nude, they were decapitated and scratches covered most of their bodies. These women were tortured before they were killed.

  “Help us.” One of the women abruptly sat up, her eyes staring blind at the pair in the doorway. A sword was still stuck in the woman’s chest, the wound now seeping blood, it ran down her body in thick rivulets.

  “Fuck,” Owen cursed after they both nearly soiled their pants, the woman’s sudden movement making them jump out of their skins.

  “Help us.” Another one sat up from her position on the floor and reached out her hands like a toddler wanting to be picked up.

  “What did this?” Sierra’s voice was wavering; she was staring at the women coming to life around them. She looked down at the body of a young girl, she couldn’t be more than fifteen. A child. Dead and possibly raped.

  Her eyes shot open and she wailed. She wailed a death keen and Sierra clutched at Owen’s hand in terror. It was pain, terror and longing all wrapped into one sound. Owen and Sierra flung themselves back and away from the women. Owen almost tripped over another body in the hallway and he had to steady himself on the wall. A wall that was dripping with blood.

  “Shit, shit, shit,” he cursed, wiping his hands on his jeans. “This is crazy. This isn’t real. Crazy, this has to be a nightmare,” he repeated and Sierra grasped his hand, pulling him close to her.

  “We can do this, c’mon.” She pulled him away from the room and the girl’s wail cut off. The women’s bodies fell back into their death positions. They were done for now.

  The pair heard a clatter of noise. It was close, through a pair of doors. Owen and Sierra opened the doors and stepped out into a courtyard. From death to life in one small step over a threshold. The paved courtyard was teeming with flowers and tropical plants, potted ferns were in every corner and lush banana trees reached to the second story. Honeysuckle and jasmine vines crept up trellises, and the smell washed over them as if it was a hot summer night. Birds of paradise and gardenia bushes teemed with flowers, the fragrant gardenia almost overpowered the underlying smell of blood. But the smell was still there. Still lurking in the recesses and the cracks. No amount of flowery smell could overpower death.

  Something dark loomed here.

  Sierra slipped her hand into Owen’s as she felt him shudder at her side. He felt it too. Something wasn’t right. Whatever it was, it was hungry, so very hungry. The sky above them was dark, stars by the millions could be seen above, the city lights not bright enough to filter out the weak light of the stars. She wanted to look up and marvel at the difference, try to figure out which constellation was which, but a darkness lingered close and she couldn’t let her guard down. Something lurked in the back of the courtyard. Sierra could feel it.

  A loud clatter came from the back of the courtyard and both of them startled, jumping from the sound. The shadows were deeper back there. The light from the one gas lamp in the center of the courtyard did nothing to penetrate the darkness.

  “Welcome,” a snakelike voice hissed from the shadows.

  Sierra made a tiny squeal of surprise, but gripped the scimitar with a death grip and brandished it in front of her.

  “We’re here to help. We’re here to save the Sultan, you can’t hurt us,” she said with more bravado than she felt.

  “What can you do, female? You cannot save anyone, not even yourself,” the voice hissed and Sierra looked down, noticing the swirl of fog at her ankles. It was thick and moved
around the courtyard as if it had a mind of its own.

  “I’m here to help,” she said boldly.

  “We’re here to help,” Owen added and Sierra smiled gratefully at him.

  “There is nothing you can do. Take your female and leave. If you stay, you shall join us for eternity. I shall feed off your pain and your lust until your souls evaporate. I rule this place, this is my domain. Leave or I shall own you!” The fog coalesced around them. It started to become thicker in front of them, forming into the shape of a man.

  “We won’t leave until we’ve helped the souls trapped here,” Sierra called out.

  “You will help no one!” the voice yelled. “You have come to feed me!” The fog moved in a parody of a living man. Slowly features were forming. The fog solidified into dark, black skin, bright green eyes, shining from the shape that was the head.

  “What are you?” Owen asked, not stepping back even though the thing was only a foot away, dark and demonic.

  “I am the Peri, the Jinn, the demon of your nightmares. This is my domain. You have come to feed me, everything that comes here feeds me. I was given this domain to rule. I feast and I have become stronger than ever before because of my feast. And now you have come to make me even stronger!” The black shaped thing made a move like it was going to attack and both Sierra and Owen held up their blades in protection.

  The demon began to laugh.

  “Your paltry human weapons are nothing against my might.”

  The demon was getting solid. Sierra knew she couldn’t let it form into a solid thing, something bad would happen if it got that far. She didn’t know how she knew that, but it felt right. She had to destroy this thing, but had no idea of how to do it. She was mesmerized by the swirling of the fog as it slowly began to become more defined, more real. She noticed jewels sparkling at its throat and wrists. She began to see the pattern of its clothes. The color of its hair.