Soul Inheritance

by Honey A. Hutson

  “I like it when they scream,” a wispy voice slid from his throat.

  Fear mounted in her chest as Gretchen realized he could do anything he wanted. No one could hear her cries.

  ‡

  Katherine awoke to a bright morning and the sound of birds welcoming the sun. Rubbing her eyes she shuffled to the bathroom and stood, hands on the edge of the sink, looking into the mirror. For just an instant someone else stared from the glass. Her, but not her. She stepped back, never breaking her gaze into those foreign eyes. Golden flecks shown in the corneas, as if glowing from within and then they were gone.

  She took a deep breath, relaxed, decided it was a trick of the light. She showered, dressed, put her bags in the car and returned the door card to the desk. It was a beautiful day.

  “Great day for driving,” the clerk said as he took the key. She nodded and left.

  Katherine followed I-95 until she came to the Salem, Massachusetts exit. For reasons she could not have given she decided suddenly to take a break by spending the rest of the day in Salem. After all it was October now and it was the infamous Salem. All of her life she had wanted to go there to enjoy the relaxed and jovial atmosphere of the fall festivals and Halloween celebrations. This was the perfect chance, nothing and no one to hold her back. The closer she got to Maine the less anxious she was to get on with the introductions.

  Halfheartedly she joked, talking only to the empty car, “After all, it’s been waiting all this time, it can wait another day.”

  “You know you really shouldn’t joke about such things,” the wispy deep voice from her nights answered. Every nerve in her body sang. Her heart beat like a rabbit’s in her chest, but she kept the road focused and did not waiver.

  Katherine glanced in the mirror, then the backseat. Nothing. She relaxed, thought for a moment.

  “I’m just tired. I’ve been driving too long.”

  “Still trying to reason me away.”

  She took a deep breath. “If you want me alive, you’d best stop that shit of messing with me in the car.” She couldn’t believe she was giving in to it, answering the deep voice that came to her from… wherever. Possibly antagonizing it.

  “It makes little difference how you come to me, so long as you come. Dead, alive. It’s all the same.”

  Chills sliced through her, curling her toes, tightening her grip on the wheel until her fingers were white. She wrapped her mind around his comment, searched it for a reasonable reply.

  “That can’t be true. If it were you would have already killed me, like you did my father.” The last was an afterthought, but it fit. She had known, deep inside, the real cause of death.

  It laughed deeply and long. “Oh, yes Mitch. She’s so very smart. You’ve done well and will be rewarded for your service.” Its words faded, as if it were walking away, talking to someone else. Katherine pulled off to the side of the road. Shaking more from anger than fear she fumed. It, he, could not be believed, yet something inside her wanted to listen. Wanted him to be trustworthy enough to answer her questions.

  “It isn’t true. It’s all lies; you know it is. Dad wouldn’t do that.” Anger flooded her eyes, spilled out over her cheeks in crimson splashes. “Lies! I won’t believe your shit, you bastard! I don’t know what the hell you are, but I’ll find you. I’ll find a way to get rid of you! My father wouldn’t do that, he loved me. He loved me!” She broke down in sobs. After a few moments, she reached over to the passenger seat, pulled a tissue from the box and concentrated on getting it together. “I can’t let him get to me. That’s what he wants. Maybe I’ll find something in Salem to help.” She laughed, “If there’s anyone in the world who’d know how to help, it’d be there.”

  The drive into Salem was short and scenic. Katherine circled until she found a bed and breakfast on a quiet street shaded by huge trees. It was a beautiful home. Three stories high, with cedar shingles and a small arbor over the intricate wooden gate. She pulled into a parking spot down the street. As she reached up to open the wrought iron fastener she noticed something glistening in the foliage growing on the arbor. Upon close examination she found herself standing under dozens of prisms in various shapes. They caught the light, spinning off a variety of radiantly colored specks. Katherine smiled, continued up the walkway, and climbed the wooden steps to the porch.

  Wind chimes lined the length; gently jingling though there didn’t seem to be any air moving around them. The entry door was intricately carved in Celtic patterns, with a thick, oval etched glass in the center. She stood there, wondering whether to knock or if it was okay to go in. Finally she went in.

  Katherine wandered slowly down the hallway. The interior of the house was plain, with old fashioned plank wood paneling in a rich dark walnut. Matching floors ran throughout the house with decorative runners in the hallways and on the stairs. The doorjambs were massive and old, wide in girth, with the scars evident on the surfaces. She stopped and put her hand on one side of the entry to what was once known as a parlor. The little nicks under the finish were rough under her hand.

  “Those were the marks of my children.”

  Katherine turned around. A woman in her fifties, with long, silver hair stood there smiling gently. She had a fair complexion, was average in every way, dressed casually in a loose silk top with the classic Chinese frog closures across the front, loose pants, and sandals. Her gray eyes seemed to bore right into the soul. Katherine smiled back. The woman instantly put her at ease.

  “How old are they now?”

  “Oh, well into their thirties. We made those marks as they grew from just wee things until they left home.”

  “You’ve been here a long time, then.”

  “Oh, yes. I inherited this house as did my mother before me and hers before her and so on.” She quietly assessed Katherine. “So what brings you to Salem?”

  “I was traveling and just… well, it felt right.”

  “Um, I know that feeling. The same reason it just felt right to have a guest room kept open this week.” She put out her hand. “I’m Dora Ellsworth. Welcome to my home. I have a suite up on the third floor I think you will find very comfortable, with a private bath and a nice little balcony with a view of the gardens out back.” She withdrew an old key with purple and white ribbons that read “Dora’s Place” from her pocket. “It’s the one at the end of the hall, the only suite up there. The other room is a library. A lot of fascinating reading if you’re interested. Perhaps some things you’re looking for in there. When you’re settled, come out back, I’ll be in the garden...”

  Katherine reached out and took the key. Her eyes met Dora’s. There was understanding there. A quiet knowing that danced around within the light that burned in those old doorways to an ancient soul. She slipped the key into her pocket, nodded and turned for the door. Just as she put her hands on the knob Dora called back down the hall.

  “Oh, Katherine?” She turned to face Dora with her hand on the open door. “Welcome to my home.”

  “Thank you.” Katherine was out the door before she realized that she had not told Dora her name. She stood on the porch, taking in the friendly, warm atmosphere. A confidence, knowledge from a place she had not been aware of reached out. She knew that this place was okay, though she couldn’t say how. She also knew that she was safer here than anywhere she had ever been. There was an energy that emanated from Dora’s Place. It was power, safety, and so much more.

  Katherine gathered the bags she needed, took them into the house. She stood in front of the stairs. They were a dark wood like the rest of the house, but the rail leading up was carved in a spiral pattern with a head and face at the end and at every turn on every landing. Picking up her bags she started the climb to the third floor. She stopped at the last landing, catching her breath.

  The hallway was dark with two doors, one directly to her right, which was open. Inside was a cozy library with a
table in the middle and a reading lamp. There were shelves full of books from floor to ceiling along all the walls and overstuffed chairs in either corner. The other door was down the short corridor to her left. She moved toward it, dropped her bags in front of the closed door and fished in her pocket for the key.

  Katherine laid her bags on the large four poster bed and looked around. The room was what she had always wanted her bedroom to look like. Very sturdy, old furniture filled the spacious area, from the heavy, but simple four poster bed, to the tall wardrobe with it’s scrollwork on the top, to a lovely dressing table complete with a walnut framed mirror and bench. She sat on the edge of the bed, ran her hands over the plush comforter with its dark navy background and raised gold embroidered designs. The curtains that hung on the window matched the bedspread. A French door led out onto the small balcony. The curtains were pulled to either side and shear panels hung in the middle, covering the glass, but letting in the light.

  Katherine abandoned her bags, opened the doors. A strong breeze greeted her, fluttered the shear panels to either side and blew her hair out from around her face. She stood with her hands on the rails looking out over a neat little space filled from one end to the other with flowers of all sorts, green grass in between the beds and a vegetable and herb garden on the end. If ever she had a dream house this was it.

  Dora was in the garden. Katherine turned, left the room and descended the three flights of stairs. She found her way down the dark hallway to the back of the house, where she passed through a sizable kitchen and out the back door to a screened in porch. It was pleasantly furnished with flowering pots and ferns hanging all along the sides. She continued into the back yard.

  Dora was clipping herbs in the garden, putting them into a tattered basket. She looked up from her work as Katherine came down the path.

  “Dora, your house is lovely. And the flowers! How do you get them to bloom so late?”

  “Patience, and years and years of practice. And my Momma taught me a few tricks as well.” She nearly glowed as she showed Katherine around the yard, naming the flowers and herbs, showing off the small pond with the bench hidden in a back corner. She ended her tour back where it had begun at the herb garden.

  “So. Are you staying long?”

  “Well, I thought I might see a little of Salem and rest for a day or two. I’ve been driving for two days and was a little tired when I began.”

  “Where you headed?”

  Katherine paused. “I inherited some property in Maine. I’m on my way there to settle a few… unanswered questions.” The air around them trembled with energy, like a wave on a pond, shimmering and bright in the sunlight. Katherine looked around, shivered.

  Dora smiled. “Yes, I see.” She held up her hand. “It’s a heavy burden you carry. There’re dark things clinging to your essence, trying to feed on it. But you’re strong. You carry a light and protection of your own. It fends them off just enough to keep you safe.”

  Katherine did not speak. She didn’t know what to say, how much she really could say.

  “You have questions about your life, your past, your family.” Dora straightened, gathered her tools and bucket, rubbed her back. “I’m getting old. Anyway. You must explore those things. People take their heritage far too lightly these days. There’re things hidden in our past, those of our ancestors that affect us in the here and now.”

  The shimmer came again. Katherine’s body tingled with the energy. She noticed the hair on Dora’s arm prickle.

  “What is that?”

  Dora faced her, those sparkling eyes intent. “You know so little of the past, don’t you? Of yourself even. That’s the dark ones. When you passed into my home, they were bared from following. This’s a good and strong place with roots reaching out over hundreds of years. My ancestors brought great protection here. They planted and tended it carefully and taught each generation to respect and use it.”

  They stopped beneath a huge oak tree that grew in the back of the yard, where the path encircled it. Dora looked up, laid a hand on its trunk. “Oaks are very powerful guardians you know. As are willows. Infused with the right kind of magic and care they’ll protect you from everything you don’t want to enter. They were often planted by cemetery gates to keep the bad things out, or in some cases in.”

  Katherine looked around. The yard was bordered on all sides by oaks and willows. Dora’s serious, gentle gaze did not falter. “You’re safe here. Use my library, search for answers that may help you do what you must. There’s even an internet hookup up there.” She put her hand on Katherine’s arm. “Now, let’s go in and fix some lunch.”

  Chapter six

  The fiftyish, plump woman knocked on the door again.

  “Gretchen.” Her volume increased with anxiety. The supervisor at the car rental had called, concerned that her car was still there. He had wanted to know if she was having trouble, if she needed a ride to work tonight. No one seemed to know how she had gotten home. She hadn’t had a phone in months. Not since her mother refused to bail her out of the last huge bill she ran up calling men she’d met on the internet. Her mother was just a few miles down the road, so she could manage without it.

  “Surely you had more sense than to hitch, again,” her mother mumbled as she waddled off the porch and went around back. She stopped short when she saw the back door standing open. Slowly she approached, called out again.

  “Gretchen?”

  Something stirred inside. She stepped up the first two steps, then stopped. There was something stooped in the hallway, beyond the kitchen. A black figure the size of a large dog shifted there. It moved, unfurled and straightened; stretching upward to stand much taller than a man. It turned and looked at her through the darkness in the narrow space. The red eyes sliced through the shadows, like hot coals in the fireplace on a dark night. She gasped. Her heart pounded, then ceased to beat at all as she stood eye to eye with a creature she could not have imagined in her worst nightmares. It stopped again, drew back, then sprang forward, spreading it’s wings as it flashed through the kitchen, folded them again as it shot through the door and took to the air, it’s claws scraping the porch on it’s way by. The wind from its movement knocked her off her feet as she watched it glide and disappear. Shaking she ran back to the green station wagon and sat down hard in the seat. Fumbling and breathless she dialed 911.

  The Bangor police responded, spoke with the traumatized woman and proceeded to the backdoor. The two officers glanced at each other after they were around the corner. Tolbert, the senior officer took the lead, easing quietly up the stairs and into the kitchen. There were bloody footprints, but what the hell kind of shoe would make that print? Pulling his gun he stepped carefully past it. Twelve years on the force, he knew his stuff. Bennett was fresher, with only three years in, but he was a good partner.

  Carefully he followed the trail, partner in tow, gun in hand, growing more wary, and steeling his nerves for what obviously lay ahead. The footprints were heavy and fresh. Each officer made his way down the narrow hallway, trying not to step on the evidence. The bedroom was the first door on the left.

  Tolbert peered carefully in. The room was shredded. Pillow stuffing and feathers from the down comforter stuck to everything and floated in the air at the slightest draft. The covers and sheets lay in torn tatters, scattered on one side of the floor. The mattress had three long tears down the middle at an angle. The bedside table lay bent on the other side of the room, its glass top broken and littering the floor. There was blood in the mix. Streaks from the bed, to the floor and leading down the hall to the bathroom. One streak in particular caught his eye. It was a handprint that started beside the bed and streaked across the floor, as if she had been reaching for something to grab as she was dragged from the room.

  In all of his years on the job Tolbert had never seen such havoc. Not here, not in Bangor. Bennett was visibly alarmed as he gripped hi
s gun tighter. He took a shaky breath, nodded toward the bathroom.

  Tolbert motioned him to wait, as he cleared the room across the hall, apparently used for storage. They continued through the house, on either side of the widening trail that stopped at the bathroom door. The light was not on inside. Bennett reached out, pushed the door slowly open, while Tolbert reached around the corner and switched on the light with the back of his hand. They both fought to keep calm.

  The sink and floor were covered with blood, the metallic scent seeping into their nostrils. There were several small handprints on the door jam and the wall. Bennett averted his eyes toward the ceiling, away from the gore.

  “Oh God.” He turned away from the scene entirely, too nauseated to stand without leaning on the wall.

  Tolbert looked up. There were small handprints there, too, so thick with blood that every feature of the hand that made them showed. He stepped forward, unable to avoid the blood now. There was a piece of clothing draped over the closed curtain.

  “Ray, stay there.” He replaced his gun and took out a nightstick.

  It was the only thing in the room that seemed to have no blood on it and a collar of thin fur. He poked at it, tried to open it up. It was coated in a clear viscous fluid. He gave up, pushing the shower curtain back.

  Tolbert had expected the usual. A dead body dumped in the tub. Perhaps cut up more than he was used to, but he had seen his share of murders. Neither man was prepared for this. Bennett gave in to his churning stomach and headed for the back door. Tolbert stood and stared in stunned disbelief, his eyes bulging, unable to look away from the small body that lay there, every inch perfectly skinned, blue eyes staring up at the shower head. It was then that he realized what hung on the rod. For the first time in his career he vomited, trying not to look at Gretchen’s carefully removed skin.

  Nigel turned into Bangor at four and headed for the Marriott.