Captive (Demonic Games Book 3)

by Sara Clancy

  Captive

  Demonic Games Series Book 3

  Written by Sara Clancy

  Edited by Emma Salam

  Copyright © 2018 by ScareStreet.com

  All rights reserved.

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  Welcome,

  Sara Clancy

  Table of Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

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  Chapter 1

  The ghostly noises had kept Mihail up for days now.

  A combination of dull thuds and grinding cranks that echoed from the depths of Castle Vaduva. They had become an ever-present part of Mihail’s daily life, one that set his teeth on edge and made something sour and bitter line the pit of his stomach. When he tried hard enough, he could forget about it for a while.

  But he couldn't dismiss the screams.

  They came sporadically. Each one, shrill and violent. A cry filled with so much agony that they barely sounded human anymore. His grandmother, the only other living person within the castle walls, was able to ignore it. Whatever event the ghosts were reliving down there, it wasn’t something Mihail wanted to know, but he couldn’t just pretend that he didn't hear their pain.

  A priest had blessed the house over and over, but the screams, and clanks, and groans refused to be silent. Desperate for a moment of peace, he had broken and decided to do what the spirits wanted. He would investigate the sound. But, he wasn’t going to be an idiot about it. He had with him a sturdy flashlight, a fully charged phone, and chalk to mark his way. Most importantly, he had brought Abe Claymont.

  Abe was a loyal friend, but as a physical medium, he detested the castle. He could hear, see, and touch any ghost that ventured near, and very few of them were happy about that. Some even tried to claw their way under his skin. Abe had once told him it was like being allergic to the dead. All those natural defenses a living body was supposed to have to fight off possession just didn't work for him. So, a place as haunted as Mihail’s ancestral home was a perilous place for him to be. He very rarely went beyond the courtyard, and Mihail had been prepared for some very undignified pleading to get him to agree. In the end, all it had taken was for Abe to hear the screams himself. After that, everything had been about ensuring the proper precautions were in place for their trip.

  Mihail had been confident that Abe could get them in and out unharmed. But as they headed down yet another flight of damp stone steps, with the low roof forcing Abe to stoop and the narrow walls crowding against them, fear began to simmer through his veins anew.

  “Why didn't the blessings work?” Mihail whispered.

  For a long time, the only sounds around them had been their footsteps and the constant commotion that drew them ever deeper into the subterranean labyrinth. It didn’t seem right to break it now.

  Abe, apparently, didn't share that feeling. “They have nowhere to go.”

  “I’m sorry,” Mihail said, speeding up a little to keep Abe’s longer stride from leaving him behind. “I’ve been trying to read all of those books you gave me, but it’s surprisingly complicated. Who even knows what ‘echolalia’ means, anyway?”

  “It’s when a ghost repeats back what you said.”

  Mihail ignored the comment. “And all those winter break assignments are proving to be time-consuming.”

  “Still can’t believe you failed chemistry.”

  Mihail scowled. “This is my first time doing high school by correspondence. Not to mention that it's my senior year. It's a big workload.”

  “Right.”

  “Do you know how hard it is to study in a haunted house?”

  Abe paused. His flashlight beam remained on the sloping stairs while he looked over his shoulder to fix Mihail with a disbelieving look.

  “Oh. Right,” Mihail smiled weakly. “Sorry. You were saying?”

  Snorting, Abe turned back around and started walking again.

  “Cliff notes version; blessings force evil spirits out and appease the good ones so they can move on. The problem here is that someone put up a whole heap of boundaries to cage them in. There ain’t nowhere for them to go.”

  “Who would do that?”

  Mihail didn't need to see Abe’s face to know the expression that was covering it. “Oh, gee, if only there were a witch we could blame this on.”

  “Just because Bunica Draciana can do a few spells doesn’t mean that she’d do something like that.”

  “Ya kiddin', right? There has to be a limit to your ability to look the other way.”

  Mihail knew that there wasn’t any use in pushing the point. His grandmother and Abe had despised each other since the moment they met. And nothing they uncovered about each other had eased the situation.

  Still, Mihail felt compelled to say something. “It wasn’t her fault the Coven came here. She didn't have a choice.”

  “So she says. That woman lies like she breathes.”

  A scream ripped down the narrow corridor. Mihail plastered himself against the wall, sure that some monstrosity was going to come crashing out of the darkness. While Abe winced, he didn’t stop walking.

  To anyone else, he would have looked completely unconcerned. Mihail, however, knew his friend well enough to understand that the more graceful the lumbering giant was, the more trouble they were walking into. Years of boxing had left Abe with a natural tendency to become agile when he was expecting a fight. The looser he got, the tenser Mihail became.

  Their flashlights barely carved into the darkness as they moved around the damp abyss. The oppressive cold and constant darkness began to play tricks on Mihail's mind. In one instant, he could believe that he and Abe were alone. The next, it sounded as if a hundred people were shuffling along behind them. There could be. The thought whispered in his head, making fear snake through the pit of his stomach and urging him to sink a little closer to his friend and only line of defense. Mihail had made peace with the fact that he wasn't a fighter.

  It hadn't occurred to him how close he was until Abe stopped short. Running into his back was like hitting a brick wall. And it was a little embarrassing that the collision didn't even make the larger man sway. Given the difference in their heights, Mihail didn't have to duck to allow Abe to scan the space behind them. So he held his ground, rubbed his forehead, and tried to smother the sparks of panic that threatened to catch light inside of him. Clanks, scrape, and thuds grew louder to fill the silence.

  Unable to take it any longer, Mihail whispered, “What is it? What do you see?”

  “Nothin’,” Abe mumbled.

  Even as he said it, he tipped his head to the side, as if listening to something. Mihail strained but there was never any chance that he would hear it, too.

  “Abe,” he whispered a little more urgently.

  “Just ...” the word trailed off as he began to suck on one of his long incisors. Since he used the same
habit to express a thousand thoughts and emotions, Mihail still had no hint as to what had changed. When he thought the tension was about to rip him apart, Abe finally added, “I think someone’s back there.”

  He shone his flashlight over the hallway again, craning his neck slightly like he might somehow increase the strength of the beam.

  “Who?”

  “Settle down,” Abe smirked. “They ain’t trying to hurt us. I think they’re just curious.”

  Forcing a smile, Mihail spoke through his clenched teeth. “Next time, could you perhaps start with the ‘no threat’ bit?”

  Mihail flinched and lifted a hand to try and block the light of Abe's flashlight. It didn't make his friend turn the beam away.

  “Why are ya talkin' like that?”

  “I don’t want whoever’s following us to think I’m impolite.”

  Abe clicked his tongue, took a deep breath, but decided to walk on rather than say whatever it was he was thinking.

  “Life and death are no excuses to be rude," Mihail protested, blinking rapidly to try and get his eyes to readjust to the dimness.

  “I'll be sure to tell them that,” Abe scoffed. “Ya know, they probably don’t speak English, right? Not much need to be bilingual in small town Romania.”

  “Which is why I’ll keep smiling while I insult you,” Mihail said under his breath, too low for Abe to hear.

  It always struck him as odd how quick people were to dismiss the value of a kind smile and some well-tailored praise. For the vast majority of his life, it was all he had needed to get his way. Admittedly, they didn’t seem to work all that well on ghosts, but that didn't mean he was going to abandon them all together.

  Finally, reaching the bottom of the stairs, the slick walls opened up to form several pathways. The combined strength of their flashlights failed to illuminate more than a few feet in any direction. They all looked the same. Narrow corridors constructed from large, uneven stones that perpetually bled icy water.

  The phenomena had kept Mihail up for countless nights. Castle Vaduva was technically in the middle of a raging current. But it was situated on top of a single spike that rose from the water, like a rotted tooth. High enough that it was only accessible by a weathered drawbridge that crossed the vast canyon. Unless they had traveled down a lot further than Mihail had realized, there should still be miles separating them from the river. He didn't know why it bothered him so much. It was hardly the only nonsensical thing about the castle.

  A crashing thud snapped him out of his thoughts. The stones began to shake violently, shuddering like a living beast and forcing a flash flood from between the rocks. Mihail’s slight frame couldn’t stand against the sudden onslaught. He struggled to keep upright as the raging torrent attempted to throw him off of his feet and carry him down one of the foreboding hallways. It didn’t take him long to lose the fight. Before he could hit the stones, however, Abe snapped a hand out and latched onto Mihail’s slender arm. As unrelenting as an iron shackle, Abe hurled Mihail against the wall beside him. It wasn't a gentle motion, but Mihail was relieved to feel the pain.

  Neither of them moved until the trembling slowly subsided and the torrents had reduced once again to haphazard drips. Mihail swallowed thickly, already numb to the bone, and pushed his wet hair back from his forehead.

  “Ya okay?”

  “Yes.” Speaking made pain pulse across his ribs and down his chest. He coughed, licked his lips, and made his voice a little louder. “I’m fine.”

  Releasing his arm, Abe patted Mihail’s head a few times, the motion forcing his now slick curls back down into his eyes.

  “Sorry. I didn’t mean to be so rough.”

  “I’m not going to complain about your methods,” Mihail said. In his panic, he had clutched his flashlight so tight that it now hurt to loosen his grip. He trailed the beam down the path he would have been carried through. “What do you think is down there?”

  “Don’t really care right now. We’re going that way.”

  Abe swept his beam down a different hall.

  “Why that one?”

  “Because the castle doesn't want us to go that way.”

  Mihail swallowed and hesitantly peeled himself from the wall. “That doesn’t seem like the best reason.”

  “I'm driven by spite,” Abe shrugged. “Come on.”

  Mihail’s thick pea coat had done a lot more to protect him than his slacks had, although it was now waterlogged and heavy. It made it harder to keep up with Abe’s stride, but at least the movement kept the cloth from freezing over.

  Abe walked as if he knew the way, and after another hour of meandering, they came to a dead end. Mihail’s gut twisted painfully when the light of their flashlights fell upon the wooden slats of a door. The boards were rotten and chipped, but still looked solid. Strips of iron crossed the surface and forged an ancient lock with a hanging loop for a handle. Despite the condition of the wood, the metal stood untouched by time, still maintaining a slight polished shine. The contrast made Mihail uneasy. He shrunk back when he realized that the noise was coming from the other side. As if sensing his fear, a scream shattered the tense silence. Lurching back behind Abe, he grabbed a handful of the taller man's jacket. While he did tilt his head to the side, Abe was kind enough not to comment on the cowardly reaction.

  “Maybe we should head back up,” Mihail mumbled.

  “You're the one that forced me down here.”

  “How could I have possibly forced you down anywhere?”

  “Emotional manipulation?” Abe said.

  “Abe–”

  “I acknowledge and respect your feelings,” Abe muttered like it was a legal waiver he had to get out of the way. “But I ain’t going anywhere. Ya castle made this personal and I'll be damned if I let it win.”

  “Is your pride worth dying for?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Oh.”

  The banter had allowed Mihail to find some peace. But all of that shattered as he watched the colossal man inch towards the door. His broad shoulders blocked Mihail’s view of what he was doing and most of the door itself. There was a slight rattle which he assumed meant that his friend had taken hold of the metal loop.

  A deranged scream ripped through the door, loud and crazed enough to have Abe flinch back. It was impossible for Mihail to hear what Abe was shouting as they tried to protect themselves from the ear-piercing sound, but he knew that they would have been somewhat creative curses in a few dozen languages. The noise died soon enough, but the ringing remained. Still, Abe gripped the door ring again and yanked. The lock held in place.

  “I don’t have a key for this room,” Mihail whispered.

  Abe huffed as he examined the door. “Your granny hasn’t given you a key for anything.”

  “That’s not true,” he snapped, regretting the outburst, as Abe turned his head just enough to cast him with a challenging look. “I have a key to my bedroom.”

  “And, how many rooms are there in this place again?”

  Mihail’s mumble of ‘somewhere in the hundreds’ didn’t go unmissed by Abe. With a humored grunt, he turned his full attention back to the door.

  “This feud of yours is getting out of hand,” Mihail noted, trying to keep the conversation going and prevent his nerves from getting the better of him. “It’s like you’re just trying to mess up her territory or something.”

  “Oh, I’ll be willing to destroy everything she owns.”

  Lifting his hand, Abe hesitated for a moment before he knocked. Three sharp taps. Mihail held his breath, every hair on his body rising as he waited for the response. After a moment of crushing silence, the clanks resumed. Abe knocked again. Both of them were surprised when whatever was on the other side repeated it back to them.

  Abe leaned one shoulder against the door and called out in his best attempt at a parental voice, “Hey, you guys called us down here. Aren’t ya gonna let us in?”

  To Mihail’s ears, there was only silence. It took a
few seconds for him to realize that Abe wasn’t hearing anything either. Grumbling under his breath, Abe held his flashlight with his mouth, unzipped the chest pocket of his new snow jacket, and pulled out a Swiss army knife. He unfolded a slip of metal from the base as he crouched down.

  Mihail couldn’t bear to hear the sounds echoing from the room a moment longer and surged into the first conversation that came to mind. “New jacket?”

  Caught off guard, Abe glanced at him before he grunted and went back to what he was doing.

  “It looks good. Way better than your old one.”

  He didn’t spare him another glance, but gave a slight muttered sound that still somehow conveyed perfect dismissal.

  “Something about it is really familiar.” Delighted to have a mystery he could solve – that in all likelihood, wouldn’t involve death – Mihail devoted himself to the task. Unfortunately, Abe cut in and ruined it all.

  Switching the flashlight into his now free hand, he said, “It’s an old police issue. It needed a bit of patching up so Radu removed the lettering and let me have it.”

  “Radu Constantin? The officer that arrested you a month ago?”

  Abe grunted again but was more concerned with trying to work the flat of the metal between the bolt and base of the door hinge. Coming closer, Mihail squatted down next to his friend.

  “Isn’t that a little strange?”

  “Nah, everything around these parts gets reused.”

  “I meant making friends with the officer that arrested you for attempted murder?”

  “I wasn’t going to murder Owen,” Abe snapped. He gave the army knife a hard shove and worked the bolt up. It clattered to the floor as he continued. “I only wanted to hurt him. A lot.”

  “Still.”

  His shoulders heaved with a heavy, annoyed sigh. “Owen was a sexually sadistic child murderer. I just did what Radu wished he could have, which I guess is as good a basis as any to build a friendship on. That, and we’re in the same boxing club.”

  “The same club? Doesn’t it take an hour to get to his town? More than that with all of this snow.”