A ball of ice formed in Tim’s gut. If they didn’t cool it, this was going to get out of hand. He rose and he stood in front of Brad, shaking his head slightly. “No man. Let’s just let it go. Don’t let it get to you...c’mon—”
Brad shoved him aside and strode over to the library where the rocking chair sat still. He kicked the wooden chair and it slammed over, landing against the wooden shelves with a crash. “Sophie’s not part of this, you miserable bastard!”
In an instant, the room was plunged into absolute darkness. The light fixtures, and the candles were all snuffed out in the same instant.
Chapter 24
Brad
Brad was rooted to the spot in the pitch blackness. His rage at this spirit was overwhelmed by his fear of its power. With the snap of its fingers, it was able to turn Brad’s world into a black hole. He and Tim thought they could tame this thing?
Oh boy.
A light snapped on for a second across from him when Tim fired up his cell phone and shone it across the room.
Carly used the light to dart to the hallway, Brad turned to watch her and Tim scrabbled to his feet, overturning the coffee table and spilling the Ouija board to the floor.
An ice cold torrent of air whooshed past Brad. It smashed Tim to the floor, and the cell phone rocketed into the wall, shattering into a dozen pieces.
Before the blackness could again register on them, the lights in the upstairs hallways again began to flash. Three short, three long and three short again: SOS.
Booming laughter rolled through Brad. It wasn’t coming from anywhere—it was everywhere!
“Yes, my pets! Cry out for help! All of you cry out!”
Brad could hear a whimpering from Tim. “Oh shit, man, he broke my wrist!” In the staccato light Tim was lying on his side holding his damaged limb.
“WE HAVE TO GET OUT OF HEEEERE!” screamed Carly. She was at the front door, pulling on it with all her strength to no avail.
“We’re coming!” Brad tossed the coffee table aside and lifted Tim up with one hand. “Let’s get the hell out of here, man!” Together they stumbled to the door.
Brad shoved Carly aside and yanked on the front door. Nothing moved. The knob refused to turn in his hand, and when he pounded on the slab of the door it didn’t budge.
A cackling laugh echoed through him. “Fee Fi Fo Fum! I think Bradley will be the one!”
“He’s coming!” screamed Carly. Brad followed her pointing arm and turned towards the staircase.
Backlit by the lights still sending out their plea, they saw Baxter for the first time. He was lightly hopping down the stairs, one at a time. With each step, he transformed. He went from a young man, dressed in a World War II army uniform, to a bearded middle aged man wearing khakis and loafers. The only constant, as each figure morphed into the next was the maniacal grin.
“What do you guys think of my look?” he said, stopping on one step and patting his khakis. “This was all the rage on 911 at the office!”
“Who the hell are you!” Tim demanded. “WHAT the hell are you!”
“Why, I’m Thomas Baxter!” the apparition said and hopped down to the next step. “No, I’m Cory Baxter, Thomas’ grand uncle!” said the man in military dress. He hopped to the next step and Thomas Baxter reappeared, his hands shoved into his slacks, leaning back. He pointed to Tim. “And soon, you will be joining us!” Waving at Brad and Carly, he chuckled, “And these two will be joining those already upstairs!” He leaned forward and cocking an eyebrow at Brad, and then Carly, said, “Every night from now until the end of time they relive the terror of their deaths.”
“Why?” Carly said, her voice a squeak.
“TO FEED ME!” Baxter shimmered for a moment, replaced by a pulsing swirl of purple and red light. It vanished, and Baxter dropped another step to reform as the soldier.
With a gleeful smile, Uncle Baxter held out his hands. “Shhh now! Listeeeennnnn…” and hopped down a step, morphing back to bearded Thomas.
As the lights flickered on and off, they could hear a series of faint moans and cries. One layered on top of another, occasionally pierced by a far away scream. Thomas's hands rose in the air and the volume of their cries increased.
At the sound of a small child pleading and then ending in a shriek, Baxter’s eyes glittered. “That one’s my son, just as he begged me not to chop off his other leg, poor lad.” He closed his eyes and made a face of orgiastic pleasure. “His is one of my favorites.”
He hopped down the step and became Cory Baxter, resplendent in his Army uniform. A young girl’s shriek of ‘Daddy! Daddy! I can’t breathe! Stop it!’ floated from the floor above. “I chased her from the house to the dock and drowned her slowly.” Cory licked his lips. “Beautiful…” He eyed Carly. “I can’t wait to see how you’ll match up. A small girl, and a flowered woman… which will be a better meal? Tim loves you, and his smile will be the last thing you see in this life as he drowns you…”
“And you!” he pointed to Brad. “We’re going to have a ‘Brad-fire’ tonight!” Baxter squatted on the step. “I can’t wait to watch you writhe after your best friend douses you with gasoline and tosses the match!” Baxter shivered in anticipation, his eyes closed. Opening them, he said, “Okey-dokey, here we go!”
He waved a hand and the three of them froze in place. Brad’s feet were welded to the floor. He watched as Baxter came down the rest of the stairs and in horror, approached Tim.
“Hi Tim! How’z it goin’?” Baxter said. He held out his arms. “Give us a hug, Bro!” He looked over to Carly as the door to the house swung open with a creak. “You better get going, girl.” With a Groucho Marx waggle of his eyebrows he said, “We’ll be right behind you!”
Carly flew out the door, shrieking.
Chapter 25
Sophie
From the moment she opened her eyes that morning, Sophie knew this was going to be a Day of Days.
All her life she had been one of those rare people who bounced out of bed, grateful for the gift of a new day. Whether she was hung over, sick with the flu or having a bad period, she always woke up with a sense of gratitude and joy. It drove her parents and her older brother crazy sometimes, but that’s the way she was. Even as a baby, when she woke up in her crib, she would lie on her back and sing until Mommy or Daddy came in to get her.
Only once before in her life had she awoken the way she did this day. That day started the same way this day did—she woke up crying.
And that Day of Days was the day her Nana was killed. All the police reports, and even her parents had told her that it was probably a drunk driver that ran off the road, hit her and sent her careening into that oak tree.
Neither the driver nor the car was ever seen nor found.
Sophie had always known it had been murder.
Because Nana told her that night.
Ten years ago, on the night that Nana had died, her spirit came to Sophie. She had been lying in bed crying over poor Nana when in a gentle twinkling of diffused light she was sitting at the foot of her bed.
“Nana!” she cried out reaching to hug her. But her arms went through the old woman’s figure. Sophie sat back on the bed and whispered. “You're a ghost?”
Nana nodded. “Yes, dear, this is my spirit. My body has stopped and I’ll be moving on soon.” Her lips moved, but Sophie didn’t hear Nana with her ears, she heard her in her head.
“No, dear, you hear me in your heart.”
Sophie’s hand went to her breast. “My heart’s broken, Nana.”
Nana smiled sadly and nodded. “I know. But you’ll be safe now. The Beast won’t be back for some time. When he returns, you must be ready.”
A chill of fear speared the girl. “The Beast?”
Nana nodded. “Yes. He is the dark half of our universe. He feeds on fear and hate. Despair is his dawning joy. Everything you and I hold to be beautiful and good is an abomination to him. Everything he values is anathema to us. It was one of his lackey
s that took me from this world today, Sophie.”
“Why?”
Nana leaned forward. “To hurt you. To take away your hope, to drown the fire of joy within you with sadness and despair.”
“Me?”
Nana nodded. “You are special, Sophie. So very, very special.”
“Why me?”
“I don’t know, darling. I only know that the Creator has chosen you. You’ve been protected from the wrath of the Beast by the Creator’s angels, and so the Beast took me as a way to hurt you.”
“He’s awful!” Sophie’s fists pounded her mattress.
“The Creator’s angels have let me return to this plane, but I cannot stay.” Nana tried to cup Sophie’s face in her hands, but had no more success touching her than Sophie had earlier. “Remember, child, love is eternal. Love will conquer fear. One day you will need to remember that, so remember it well.” She stood up and holding her arms out from her waist, she said, “Until we meet again, my dearest Sophie… fare thee well…”
Her voice and figure shimmered and faded, and she was gone.
But she left behind a sense of hope and joy. “Until we meet again, Nana,” she said.
This day, she woke as she had that day—the tears flowing told her that terrible things were going to happen. She went through her day at work and came home feeling each passing moment of the day weigh heavier and heavier upon her.
Even Aphra had kept her distance from her today, phoning her in the morning to tell her she would be unable to be there.
And for the first time since she began to work there, not a single person came through the door all day. When she left to return home, the streets were empty, too.
When she tried to phone Brad, her phone erupted in static. When she tried to send him a text message, the icon just kept spinning on the screen of her phone, going round and round. She wished she had Tim’s number; even though she was sure that she would get the same result.
She considered going out to their Inn… but was too afraid. When she had gone there the first time, the throbbing malignancy that was present was too much to bear.
Coming home she lit incense and tried to meditate, but couldn’t empty her mind.
She went to get something to eat, but could only choke down a crust of bread and a small glass of wine.
SOPHIE! IT’S TIME!
It wasn’t Nana’s voice. It wasn’t a voice at all. It was… a presence. And in that presence she felt the power of stars a ‘borning and the beauty of all that was good. Even so, she shut her eyes tightly. “No! I’m not going out there!”
It’s time, Sophie. You have been chosen…
“No! Choose somebody else!” She fell to the floor, prostrate. What the hell did they want from her? She was a store clerk for heaven’s sake! She was nothing special! But that… that THING out at the lake… THAT was something ‘special’! It made her sick with fear. She lifted her head. “I didn’t ask for this! It’s not fair!” She got up onto her knees, lifted her face and said, “You need a SWAT team, not a clerk!”
I need YOU. Have faith in ME and in yourself and go.
“But…”
Or they’ll all die horribly and will be trapped for millennia!
She struggled to her feet. “But… but…”
Sophie! GO NOW! HURRY! You may already be too late!
She jumped up, put on her sandals and fled out the door.
A moment later she ran back in and grabbed her slouch bag of talismans and charms and fled again.
***
When she had turned off the road to the drive, she saw the lights flickering on and off and knew the signal being sent.
Save Our Souls!
“I’ll die trying,” she said out loud, then gave a snort. There was an excellent chance that she was going to find out just what was worse than dying, actually. As she grew closer to the house, she could hear the moans of those trapped souls and the cackling laughter of the Beast.
She hadn’t heard the presence since she left her apartment.
Crap.
After hearing the cries and moans she couldn’t turn back though. Damn it.
She had pulled her car right up to the edge of the veranda and jumped out of the car.
At that moment the front door flung open and Carly came running out shrieking. Her hair had turned completely white.
Chapter 26
Carly jumped onto Sophie. “Help meeee! Tim’s going to drown me! Help meeee!” Saliva dribbled from the girl and the front of her dress was sodden.
Sophie clutched at the poor girl, holding her. “Fear not, all will be well,” she said, not believing a word of it.
From the open doorway of the Inn, terror and despair blasted out in a rage of blue-white light as if it were an explosion, enveloping the two of them in a tumult of hopelessness. Arms entwined, they staggered and tripped back from the house. Carly led them around the large maple tree and hid behind it.
She clutched at Sophie. “We have to run! Run away!”
“Shhh...” said Sophie with a calm she didn’t feel as the world around her tumbled. She brought Carly to the side of the property. “Shhh... sit and be well.” She lowered the girl to the ground. “I’m going to fetch Brad and Tim now.”
Carly stared at her with unfocused eyes. “You’re going back there?”
Sophie nodded. “I don’t have a choice.” She raised a hand and pointed at the house. “That thing is evil!” She looked at the building, the white and blue light blasting from the doorway. “If it’s not stopped, all is lost,” she said in an even voice. She looked down at Carly. “Come with me.”
“Are you crazy?”
With a shrug of her shoulders and a series of quick nods, Sophie said, “Yeah, probably!” She pointed her chin at the house. “But that thing’s worse!”
Carly sat back. “I... I don’t think I can.”
Sophie nodded. “I understand,” she said and set off for the doorway.
As she approached the building the air closed in around her, a hundred—no a thousand times worse than when she had first come out to the house. It was so close she gasped as she struggled to put one foot before another.
Staggering, she made it to the steps to the veranda. Everything else had gone deathly quiet. All she could hear were those moans and cries, and even they were muted.
The four steps to the porch could have been a climb to Mt. Everest for all the energy she had left from simply crossing the yard.
She patted the side of her slouch bag and felt the side of the bible she had packed into it.
Nana’s bible.
“The Lord is my shepherd,” she whispered. A surge of energy shot through her and she put her foot on the stairs. “I shall not want!” she said as she stepped up.
She raise her foot to the next step. “Yea, though I walk through the valley of death!”
She raised her next foot onto the porch. “I SHALL FEAR NO EVIL!”
A hand grabbed her shoulder. “Me neither,” said Carly.
Together, holding hands they went into the howling blue-white light, crying out “I FEAR NO EVIL!”
Going through the door, it slammed so loudly behind them it cracked down the middle in two. And a laughter of malevolent glee drowned out their prayer.
Chapter 27
The Beast had shed its skins of Baxter and Baxter and stood before her. Sophie blinked.
“Nana?” she said.
“Oh Sophie, I’m so glad you came!” Nana held out her arms. “Come to me child!”
Leaving a silent Carly behind her, Sophie stepped forward carefully. “Nana?”
With a love she hadn’t seen in a decade, her Nana bade her to come. Sophie smiled and her hand went into her slouch bag. She pulled out a plastic water bottle, flipped its lid and doused her Nana with its contents.
“Blessings upon you!” she cried out.
The holy water splashed all over Nana and began to sizzle and pop like an acid bath. She shrieked in agony and grew in
size and hate as her flesh fell away. And when Nana was gone, the Beast began to show its true self. It flipped and changed like a slideshow on high speed. From a visage of a cloven hoofed, horned demon to a multi-armed Hindu deity to a Chinese dragon headed man the Beast moved through all of the depictions of evil humanity had created throughout history.
“I fear no evil, I fear no evil,” Sophie repeated over and over.
Finally, the Beast stopped its morphing and Sophie gasped, staring at its smile.
She was looking at herself. “How do you like me now, Sophie?” it said. “There’s as much of me in you as your ‘Lord’ is within you.” It raised its hand to strike her.
She didn’t flinch. She clasped her hands together and said, “May the Lord’s will be done.” She brought her hands to her lips and closed her eyes. Whatever would now happen would be the will of the Creator. She was summoned here and she held true, but the power that would vanquish this beast was not within her.
She would miss her mornings. “May the Lord send you back where you belong,” she said quietly. “For you don’t belong here!”
Sophie/Beast hesitated. “No begging for your life?” It smiled at her. “C’mon, give into the fear!”
“His will be done,” she said quietly. “I trust in the goodness of the Creator more than I fear you.” She wished her knees got that memo— they were knocking together like a snare drum.
In that moment of faith, she felt a power course through her like she had never experienced before. Raising her head, she cried out, “I REBUKE YOU EVIL ONE!” Her voice was the voice of ages, the voice of Joan of Arc, Circe, Durga and Maja, a commanding force that bellowed, shaking the very foundations of the house. Iridescent silken threads sparked through a silvery white aura enveloping her body like armour.
The Haunted Inn (Haunted House Ghost Story): The Hauntings of Kingston Page 14